{"id":43547,"date":"2021-11-25T11:53:00","date_gmt":"2021-11-25T18:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/more-colorado-workers-quitting-their-jobs-now-than-in-the-past-20-years\/"},"modified":"2021-11-25T18:53:00","modified_gmt":"2021-11-25T18:53:00","slug":"more-colorado-workers-quitting-their-jobs-now-than-in-the-past-20-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/more-colorado-workers-quitting-their-jobs-now-than-in-the-past-20-years\/","title":{"rendered":"More Colorado workers quitting their jobs now than in the past 20 years"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"A
A sign outside a Post Office in Denver\u2019s Highlands neighborhood advertises job openings Wednesday, July 22.<\/span>Hart Van Denburg\/CPR News<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

Colorado workers are quitting their jobs at the state\u2019s highest rate in the past two decades, according to new data from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics.<\/p>\n

One in 23 Colorado workers left their jobs during September, according to a preliminary report, pushing the state\u2019s quit rate to the fourth-highest of any state in the nation.<\/p>\n

Ryan Gedney, a senior economist at the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment, said that as the economy improves and unemployment decreases, it makes sense that more people might be quitting their jobs.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t look at quit rate as a bad thing,\u201d Gedney said. \u201cI think churn and labor dynamics are healthy, and this just reflects people looking for other job opportunities.\u201d<\/p>\n

The quit rate in Colorado, following nationwide trends, dropped in early 2020 as pandemic-related stay-at-home orders were issued and unemployment soared.<\/p>\n

Now, as the economy reopens, Colorado employers are looking to fill a historically high number of job openings, creating opportunities for workers looking for better pay or a change.<\/p>\n

Gedney said that many times, the quit rate reflects people who leave their jobs and immediately take a new job, \u201cso it\u2019s really just moving from one job to the next. And sometimes that could actually be good for the economy in terms of matching the right person with the right kind of job.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is unusual for so many workers to be quitting their jobs while unemployment is this high, but Gedney said comparing job openings to unemployment is more useful.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor September, the openings-unemployed ratio for Colorado was one,\u201d Gedney said. \u201cSo that means that for every job opening, there\u2019s at least one unemployed person that could theoretically fill that job.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, the current labor market still poses challenges for employers.<\/p>\n

Lauren Furman, CEO-elect of the Colorado Chamber of Commerce, said that difficulty finding childcare and concerns over the virus could be keeping some workers from returning to work, which leaves employers short-staffed.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf a business can\u2019t continue to operate at its highest capacity and produce certain goods, or can\u2019t get certain goods, then those costs are going to go up for consumers,\u201d Furman said.<\/p>\n

Some businesses, most notably restaurants, have also cut their hours due to worker shortages.<\/p>\n

Detailed reports on which industries workers are leaving won\u2019t be available until next summer, but nationally, the highest quit rates have been in leisure and hospitality, including food services, and retail. In Colorado, the accommodation and food services workforce increased by about 65,400 workers, composing roughly half of the jobs that were added statewide this year. But the industry still hasn\u2019t fully recovered all of the workers it lost during the pandemic.<\/p>\n

October\u2019s employment report left Gedney feeling hopeful about the economy. The share of Coloradans aged 16 years and older who are now employed has increased for two months in a row, for the first time since May. Non-farm payroll jobs increased by 10,000 workers \u2014 the largest increase since April.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that certainly, the data reported (last week) was very positive, in terms of Colorado\u2019s path to recovery, and even the nation\u2019s,\u201d Gedney said. \u201cBut yes, we may see elevated quit rates for some time. And I do think that\u2019s a reflection of the economy getting better, not necessarily getting worse.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

One in 23 Colorado workers left their jobs during September<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":43548,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-43547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"Website Administrator","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43547\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/43548"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43547"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=43547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}