Yes. It's the BLS Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) series, exactly as published on FRED — real openings, not an estimate the saver invents.

Does it need an API key?

No. The pipeline reads FRED's public CSV endpoint, which is key-less, and the saver just reads the resulting JSON feed.

JOLTS is monthly and lags by about a month — the headline month is the latest the BLS has published, and the saver refreshes on that real schedule.

Does it work offline?

No. It reads a small JSON feed over the internet; offline it shows a short notice instead of stale numbers.

What counts as a job opening?

A specific position that exists, could start within 30 days, and is being actively recruited for — the BLS definition, so it's stricter than a count of online job ads.

US Job Openings (JOLTS) Screensaver

The US Job Openings screensaver charts the real monthly JOLTS job-openings series from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, fetched via FRED, as an area chart headlined in millions of open roles. It's free, needs an internet connection, and ESC exits.

How the US Job Openings (JOLTS) screensaver works

A pipeline script pulls the BLS JOLTS total job-openings series (JTSJOL) from FRED into content/jolts.json — six years of monthly data, no key needed.

The saver draws it as an area chart in the house style, with a faint gridline at each January.

The headline converts thousands of openings into a plain number — say 7.6M open roles — with the year-over-year change beside it in green or red.

JOLTS is a monthly survey published with about a month's lag, so the chart updates on the BLS release schedule, not in real time.

A worked example

Set the window to the full six years and the whole post-2020 labor cycle is on one screen: openings doubling to the 12M peak of early 2022, then the long glide back toward 7–8M. In Multi-view it sits naturally beside Labor Force Participation — demand for workers on one side, supply of them on the other.

Settings & tips

Years shown — the chart window, from a tight two-year view out to the full six-year series.

Frequently asked questions

Is this real data?: Yes. It's the BLS Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) series, exactly as published on FRED — real openings, not an estimate the saver invents.
Does it need an API key?: No. The pipeline reads FRED's public CSV endpoint, which is key-less, and the saver just reads the resulting JSON feed.
How current is it?: JOLTS is monthly and lags by about a month — the headline month is the latest the BLS has published, and the saver refreshes on that real schedule.
Does it work offline?: No. It reads a small JSON feed over the internet; offline it shows a short notice instead of stale numbers.
What counts as a job opening?: A specific position that exists, could start within 30 days, and is being actively recruited for — the BLS definition, so it's stricter than a count of online job ads.

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