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Breaking Job News: 7.2M Openings Hold Steady Amid Historic Federal Workforce Exodus

• Pete Newsome

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In today's video, host President Pete Newsome shares the August Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary released this morning by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, revealing minimal changes from July.

He discusses job openings, hires, and separations, and the significance of the upcoming ADP national employment data for September.

Additionally, Pete examines the impact of 154,000 federal workers leaving their jobs due to a buyout program aimed at reducing government size, with potential effects on key agencies like NASA and the CDC.

Stay informed with our detailed analysis and historical perspective on federal workforce trends.

News Articles:
1. BLS Job Opening and Labor Turnover Summary: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.nr0.htm
2. US Government Faces Brain Drain As 154,000 Federal Workers Exit This Week: https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/us-government-faces-brain-drain-154000-federal-workers-exit-this-week-2025-09-30/

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SPEAKER_00:

Today's big job market headline is the August Job Openings and Labor turnover summary released this morning by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. What we learned is that not much has changed since July. The numbers were essentially flat month over month. Job openings came in at 7.2 million, which is where they were the month before, but that is compared to 7.6 million in August of last year. So big decrease from there. But that's not a recent thing. That decline happened months ago, and we've been relatively flat since. Hires were down slightly, 5.1 million versus 5.2 in July. But on a positive note, so we're separations. They were 5.1 versus 5.2 million in July. And quits and layoffs were pretty much at the same level as they were the previous month. So it seems just like a whole lot of waiting and seeing for uh employers not just doing a whole lot of hiring right now, but not making significant moves in the other direction either. Now it's important to keep in mind this data is a month old. So we'll see what happens tomorrow when ADP releases their national employment data for September. So that is much more recent, but it's also collected very differently. That is payroll of private companies versus the survey data that the BLS collects. And we know that that has been criticized uh widely, to say the least, over uh the past few months and for very good reason. The revisions have been driving everyone crazy. And they did have revisions again for July, but not as extreme as they have been. In fact, they weren't too painful. Openings actually went up by 27,000. So that's a rare step in the right direction. Um, but unfortunately, hires went down by 68,000, so that's big. But separations um also went down by 68,000, so that really washes itself out. I guess you could argue there's a net gain, although reasons abound to be skeptical of those numbers. So really looking forward to see what ADP reports tomorrow morning. Hopefully that's good news. In other job news, today is the last day on payroll for 154,000 federal workers who are leaving this week after taking a buyout. The buyout program is part of the Trump administration's push to shrink the size of government. They offered financial incentives that were widely publicized earlier this year, but it also came with a threat of dismissal if you didn't take the offer and you were one of those who would be cut. And so a lot of workers took advantage of this and have effectively already been on paid leave, but it is official today on the last day of the month. Now, what this represents is the second largest single-year exodus of civil servants in the past 80 years. And that has left many concerned about what it will mean. Experts quoted in a Reuters article warned that it represents a major brain drain of institutional knowledge from key agencies like NASA, where a reported 4,000 engineers and scientists took the buyout, but also the National Weather Service, USDA, CDC, FDA. There's a lot of highly specialized staff at these organizations that won't be easy to replace. That's obvious. And it won't be quick either. And so the fears that exist are probably for good reason. This will impact everything from weather forecasting to food safety to space exploration and public health programs. So these people who are leaving are responsible for what covers a wide spectrum of things that impact Americans across the country every day. So that is going to be a significant move. But on the other side of the coin, supporters of the program point to the savings. There's$28 billion annually that is expected to be saved as a result of these, I won't say cuts, but of these departures. So we're going to have to see what happens with this over time. Now I was curious about what it represents from a historical perspective. And it turns out the federal workforce is about 1.5% of the total U.S. workforce. And I was surprised to see that number is pretty much exactly what it was 25 years ago. It has trended down over time, but the point being it really hasn't moved much in the past quarter century. And the 150,000 who were leaving is out of a total of about 3 million federal workers. That number peaked at 3.4 million in 1990, as far as I can tell. But if you're curious to see how Trump's trajectory of federal workers decreasing as compared to other presidents, Eisenhower had by far the most reductions, and President Obama had the most additions. Last year we added 27,000. This year we're losing 150,000 or more. So definitely it goes up and down. But what I found most interesting, just as a side note almost, is that it is nearly impossible to get an accurate number of how many federal employees we have. The Office of Personnel Management shows one thing, the congressional budget office data shows something else. And I looked at source after source, it's supposed to be credible, and the numbers were all over the place. So I'm using that 3 million number. Don't quote me on that, but that's as close as I could get to it. So those are your big headlines for today. But before we go, your fun fact, and that is that happiness at work can increase productivity by up to 31%. Happy workers means productive workers, which should surprise no one. It just makes sense. So wherever you are, hopefully you are happy, hopefully you're productive, and I appreciate you listening. Thank you for that. Please like and subscribe, share with anyone you think might be interested, and I look forward to speaking with you tomorrow.