Pasadena, CA -- (SBWIRE) -- 04/25/2011 -- The Labor Department has said that there are 3.1 million job openings across the country. That is an increase of 352,000 compared to January of this year.

The number of job openings is now at the highest level since September 2008. But the ratio of job seekers to available jobs is still 1:4.4, which is still an improvement of the rate of 1:5.1 in January. There are still 13.5 million Americans who are unemployed. And those are just the official numbers. The report also says that there were 3.9 million new hires in February, an increase of over 138,000 in January.

1.6 million workers were laid off or fired in February and 1.9 million workers quit their jobs. The fact that such a high number of people are quitting is also seen as a good sign of the economy and the labor market. This is because people are usually more willing to quit their jobs when they have found better positions or are confident in getting a better job.

EmploymentCrossing CEO A. Harrison Barnes says that even though most of the data says that the jobs being created are paying fewer benefits, there are plenty of jobs being created. Barnes’s firm has been able to find over 327,000 jobs in the last seven days. The main sectors are information technology (40,000+), managerial (45,000+), healthcare (71,000+), and retail (33,000+).