As the election approaches, consumer confidence increases while job openings decrease.

• In October, the Conference Board's consumer confidence index experienced a significant increase of over 11% to a reading of 138, marking its largest single-month acceleration since March 2021.
• The number of job openings decreased by more than 400,000 in September compared to the previous month, reaching its lowest point since January 2021.

Despite job openings reaching multi-year lows, consumers became more optimistic about the U.S. economy before the presidential election, as per separate reports released on Tuesday.

The Conference Board's consumer confidence index for October increased by more than 11% to a reading of 138, marking its largest one-month acceleration since March 2021. Additionally, the board's expectations index for future conditions rose nearly 8% to a reading of 89.1, which is above the sub-80 level that indicates a recession.

According to a survey by Dow Jones, economists had been seeking a headline number of 99.5.

"Dana Peterson, the board's chief economist, stated that consumers' evaluations of current business conditions improved, with views on job availability rebounding after a period of weakness. This may be due to better labor market data."

Despite a Bureau of Labor Statistics report showing that job openings decreased to 7.44 million in September, the sentiment remained positive. This was despite the fact that the number was below a Wall Street forecast of 8.0 million.

In mid-2022, the ratio of job vacancies to available workers was greater than 2 to 1, but it later dropped below 1.1 to 1.

While the number of hires increased by 123,000, the number of separations remained relatively stable, and the number of quits decreased by 107,000.