October was another month of declines in the number of people who left a job in North Carolina, another trend that matches what’s happening across the country.
Low pay, minimal opportunities for growth, and disrespectful work environments are just a handful of the top reasons employees quit their jobs, according to a 2021 Pew Research Center survey.
Of course, there are myriad reasons workers might put in their notices, ranging from the mundane, such as moving to a new state, to the dramatic, like having blow-up arguments with a supervisor.
Quits are down from the recent span of historically high rates during the Great Resignation.
Over the past 12 months, layoffs among major employers across the U.S. have tempered feelings of job security, and fears of a potential recession are keeping more people in their jobs. But, certain states continue to feel the burden of high turnover.
In October 2023, the national quit rate was 2.3%, or about 3.6 million people, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
North Carolina ranked 22nd in October’s seasonally adjusted rankings, with an estimated 123,000 leaving a job, a rate of 2.5%.
That’s down 10,000 from September (133,000 2.7%), 18,000 below August (141,000 2.9%), and 13,000 from July (135,000 2.7%). October 2022 saw 151,000 (3.1%) people quit in North Carolina.
Regionally in October, Washington DC’s quit rate was 1.8%, 14,000; Virginia 2.4%, 102,000; Maryland 2.5%, 70,000; South Carolina 2.9%, 143,000; and Georgia 2.9%, 143,000. Massachusetts had the lowest rate (1.5%, 55,000) and Alaska the highest (3.4%, 11,000).
Stacker used Bureau of Labor Statistics data to rank states by their preliminary October 2023 quit rates, using the number of quitters as a tiebreaker when needed. Quit rates are calculated by taking the number of quits during the month as a percentage of the total number of jobs in a state.
