Challenger layoff intentions are down 43.2 percent to 43,651 in December after 76,835 in November, although up 129.1 percent from 19,052 a year ago. For all of 2022, there were a total of 363,284 announced job cuts, an increase from 321,970 for 2021. A burst of layoffs in the technology sector in November and December accounts for much of the late jump in job cuts in 2022.

In December, the largest number of layoff intentions announced is 16,193 in technology, accounting for 37.1 percent of the total. In November, tech layoffs totaled 52,711, or 68.7 percent of the total. There is clearly restructuring going on in the sector, so far mainly driven by big changes at Twitter and Meta. The tapering of tech layoff announcements in December from November suggests that the initial big wave is over, but not entirely done. The concentration of layoffs in a single sector also is an indication that the economy is not facing widespread job cuts.

However, the reasons cited for job cuts do point to at least some slowdown in the economy. Among reasons cited, the largest share was in demand downturn at 16,429, or 37.6 percent of the total. The second largest was in market/economic conditions at 7,755, or 17.8 percent of the total. Together these account for over half of all planned layoffs and are the sorts of reasons that are consistent with sluggish growth.

Hiring intentions are up 71.2 percent to 51,693 in December from 30,203 in November, but are down 42.5 percent from 89,894 a year ago. For 2022, hiring plans totaled 1,482,364 compared to 1,752,327 in 2021. Businesses have scaled back hiring intentions, likely reflecting the uncertain economic outlook and/or dearth of available labor. The largest share of hiring intentions in December is in health care/products at 11,006, or 21.3 percent of the total. The next largest is energy at 7,254 or 14.0 percent of the total, and automotive at 5,800 or 11.2 percent of the total. These three account for a little under 50 percent of all hiring intentions and are in sectors generally associated with better pay and job stability.

This monthly report counts and categorizes announcements of corporate layoffs based on mass layoff data from state departments of labor. The job-cut report must be analyzed with caution. It doesn't distinguish between layoffs scheduled for the short-term or the long term, or whether job cuts are handled through attrition or actual layoffs. Also, the job-cut report does not include jobs eliminated in small batches over a longer time period. Unlike most economic data, this series is not adjusted for seasonal variation.

The job-cut report is basically a rehash of the weekly jobless claims report but provides additional insight into where layoffs are occurring. There is industry and geographic (states) detail that is not available with weekly jobless claims.