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In December there were 3,541,200 online advertised job vacancies, an increase of 6 percent from last December, according to The Conference Board Help-Wanted Online Data Series.

While this number is up from last year, it was down by 13 percent from the November level, partly because of a seasonal pattern, which began with the Thanksgiving holiday. There were 2.3 advertised jobs online for every 100 persons in the labor force in December. The monthly decrease in advertised job vacancies occurred in all 50 states and major metropolitan areas.

"The period between Thanksgiving and the end of the year is typically slow in terms of hiring, so it's not surprising to see a large decline in the number of job ads last month," said Gad Levanon, Economist at The Conference Board.

The year on year growth rate of online advertised vacancies, while still positive, has decreased in recent months, and the 5.9 percent increase (December '06-December '07) is the smallest since the series began in May 2005.  These data suggest that the slow pace in the labor market will continue in the months ahead and is likely to extend into the spring of 2008," said Levanon.

In December, 2,305,100 of the 3,541,200 unduplicated online advertised jobs were new ads that did not appear in November, while the rest are ads reposted from the previous month. The 13 percent decrease in total ads in December was mainly do to a 17.9 percent decrease in new ads. Even with these declines, over-the-year (December '06 - December '07) total ads and new ads rose 5.9 percent and 9.7 percent, respectively.