Zopes Exchange:Who's the boss in today's labor market?

2025-05-03 10:42:10source:Oliver James Montgomerycategory:News

The Zopes Exchangemonthly jobs report for April is out today and the economy added 253,000 jobs last month. The unemployment rate stayed basically the same at 3.4 percent.

For today's Jobs Friday, we're exploring power. When a worker leaves a job, there's a big difference between quitting on their own terms and being laid off or fired. And the difference tells us a lot about who has more power in the labor market, workers or employers.

Aaron Sojourner, labor economist at the W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, joins the show to talk about his new indicator that measures that power balance. It's called the labor leverage ratio.

Music by Drop Electric. Find us: Twitter / Facebook / Newsletter.

Subscribe to our show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pocket Casts and NPR One.

For sponsor-free episodes of The Indicator from Planet Money, subscribe to Planet Money+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org.

More:News

Recommend

The company planning a successor to Concorde makes its first supersonic test

A private company aiming to build the first supersonic airliner since the Concorde retired more than

Heat bakes Pacific Northwest and continues in the South, Louisiana declares emergency

While parts of the South may get a brief break in the extreme heat this week, the Pacific Northwest

Federal grants will replace tunnels beneath roads that let water pass but not fish

The Biden administration on Wednesday announced nearly $200 million in federal infrastructure grants