By John Melloy, CNBC.com
The number of people quitting their jobs in February outnumbered the amount of workers who were laid off by companies for the first time since this economic recovery began, a sign that consumer confidence may be higher than investors currently believe.
Fifty-one percent of all job separations were due to workers quitting, up from 49.8% of so-called separations in February, according to the government's Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. This is the first time quitters (presumably confident they will find another job) were in the majority since September 2008. The recession officially ended in June 2009.
"Quits go hand-in-hand with consumer confidence and for the first time of the recovery, quits represent a greater percentage of total separations than do *********** layoffs," wrote Nicholas Colas, chief market strategist at ConvergEx Group, in a note to clients that broke down the data. "Careful analysis of February's JOLTS data leaves us scratching our heads and hoping March was an anomaly."
