Employment Trend Index drops.(Industry News)

The Conference Board Employment Trends Index--ETI--fell in March. The index now stands at 90.1, decreasing 2.3 percent from the February revised figure of 92.2, and down 22.1 percent from a year ago.

"While we see a continued sharp fall in the ETI, the decline was not as strong as in the previous four months, suggesting that the most intense stage of job losses may be behind us," Gad Levanon, senior economist at the Conference Board, said. "However, the drops in each of the eight components of the ETI in March signal that many more jobs will disappear over the next several months."

The 20-month-long decline in the ETI is seen in all eight of its components, most notably over the past six months in temporary-help hires and part-time workers for economic reasons.

The ETI aggregates eight labor-market indicators, each of which has proven accurate in its own area. Aggregating individual indicators into a composite index filters out "noise" to show underlying trends more clearly.

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