Retail Sector Loses The Most Jobs In April

The retail sector had the highest number of announced job cuts among all industries in the month of April - 11,669 - according to the latest data from Challenger, Gray & Christmas, a job search and outplacement firm. Year-to-date, retail has had 50,133 cuts, up 36% from the number of cuts announced in the first four months of 2016. Retail has announced the highest number of reductions of any industry, year to to date. Health care/products (11,269), telecommunications (10,269), automotive (8,725) and energy (8,339) round out the top five. Overall, the pace of downsizing decreased in April, with total workforce reductions of 36,602. The total number of cuts announced for the first four months of 2017 was 162,803, down from 249,061 last year. The SPDR S&P Retail ETF is down 2.4% for the year to date while the S&P 500 index is up 6.7% for the period.