Alabama saw a slight drop in the number of online job postings during the month of November, according to a monthly jobs report by the Alabama Department of Labor.

There were 77,956 job ads posted in Alabama in November, which represented a 1.6 percent decrease from the previous month.

Huntsville Hospital posted the largest number of jobs with 1,089 ads

Walmart had the second highest at 923.

UAB medicine posted 788 jobs and Taco Bell posted 692.

While job ads declined slightly in Alabama, the unemployment rate rose slightly.

According to the Alabama Department of Labor, the state’s unemployment reached 3.1 percent, up from 2.9 percent in October. The rate was also higher this November than it was in November 2023 (2.8 percent).

November’s unemployment rate represents 73,278 people, according to the department.

A slow unemployment uptick is not a bad sign, according to Ben Meadows, a professor of business at UAB.

“This is kind of a best-case scenario that unemployment is ticking up, but not shooting up, as the Federal Reserve is trying to tamp down inflation,” he said.

Meadows said that while data on online ads doesn’t give a complete picture of what is happening with employment in Alabama, the report is typical.

“To me, this is kind of a vanilla jobs report, which is good. Like we don’t want anything out of the ordinary,” he said.

Nursing, retail, and truck driving were the most in-demand professions based on job ads analyzed by the state in November. There were 77,956 jobs posted, reflecting a decrease of 1.6 percent.

Nearly half the posted ads listed salaries. Of the 31,638 ads that did, 9,189 had salaries posted of $70,000 or higher, 5,411 jobs were posted with salaries of $50,000 to $69,000. 8,690 posted salaries of $35,00 to $49,000, 8,348 posted salaries less than $35,000.