Minnesota job vacancies jump, but hourly pay falls
Job vacancies in Minnesota hit a 13-year high in the second quarter of the year but the wages offered fell, the state Department of Employment and Economic Development said Thursday.
The median wage employers were offering for open positions was $12.05 an hour, down about 4 percent from $12.50 an hour in the same period a year earlier, said Oriane Casale, a labor market analyst at DEED.
That drop reflects the mix of occupations that had job openings. "Vacancies rose most strongly in lower-paid occupations and less strongly in higher paid occupations," Casale said.
Casale says of the roughly 85,000 job openings in the second quarter, 42 percent were for part-time work (fewer than 35 hours per week), a share that has been rising since the start of the recession.
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The survey also found:
• 16 percent of job vacancies were for temporary or seasonal work.
• 36 percent required some education or training beyond high school.
• 44 percent required one or more years of work experience.
• 64 percent offered health insurance, though benefits are far less common for part-time job openings.