The “Great Resignation” in perspective

Over the last year, the rate of job quitting in the United States has reached highs not seen since the start of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey program in December 2000. This recent phenomenon has been called the “Great Resignation.” While extrapolations using historical quit-rate data for manufacturing suggest that the U.S. economy exhibited even higher quit rates in the 1960s and 1970s, the recent quit rates are too high to be explained solely by labor market tightening. Future research should use individual-level data to identify and assess additional reasons why quit rates might have increased. It should also examine whether workers who have quit their jobs are taking new jobs or leaving the labor force. There is no question that the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has wreaked havoc on the U.S. labor market.