More Americans Quitting Than Being Laid Off, Stats Show

The bump-up in "job quits" may be due to signs of a more robust U.S economy, with consumer confidence, unemployment and housing values all ahead of where they stood in April 2011.

But some economists aren't so sure.

"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 involuntary layoffs," explains Nicholas Colas, chief market strategist at ConvergEx Group, in a research note first published by CNBC's Fast Money on Friday. "(But) careful analysis of February's JOLTS data leaves us scratching our heads and hoping March was an anomaly."

Maybe the great American worker knows something the eggheads in Washington and on Wall Street don't. Or more likely, an increasing amount of Americans may have finally had enough of working longer hours for shorter pay, and are striking out on their own and setting up an office in the garage, or heading off to North Dakota and Western Pennsylvania to cash in on the shale oil boom.

Nobody really knows.

But economists and maybe even nervous employers will be keeping a close eye on next month's JOLTS survey. Some of their best workers may, indirectly at least, be on it.