The number of US government job vacancies has sharply declined:

In November, government job vacancies decreased by 89,000, to 695,000, the lowest level since February 2021.

Since reaching a peak in July 2022, government job vacancies have decreased by 532,000.

They have now fully fallen back to early 2019 levels.

Additionally, the hiring rate in November dropped by 0.3 percentage points, to 1.2%, the lowest level since the outbreak of the pandemic in 2020.

Aside from 2020, this is the lowest reading since August 2014, and it is on par with the level in 2008.