Job cuts in the United States were down the third straight month in May, according to a private outplacement firm in Chicago.
Challenger, Gray & Christmas said 36,398 job cuts were announced in May, making it the third consecutive month in which job cuts declined. Challenger said that May historically is the slowest job-cut month of the year.
In April, there were 38,121 job cut announcements. In May 2012, there were 61,887 planned layoffs announced in the month.
The May total was 41 percent lower than in the same month a year ago, according to a news release.
To date, employers have announced 219,560 planned job cuts in 2013, down 11 percent from the 245,540 planned cuts announced in the first five months of 2012.
The health care sector had the most job cuts in May - nearly 5,000. Challenger says hospitals are cutting staff to prepare for less revenue from Medicare with the Affordable Care Act. But John Challenger, the firm's CEO, says hiring for other health care jobs has more than offset the cuts, averaging a net gain of 24,000 jobs a month over the past year.
The report comes ahead of the release of the monthly employment situation report by the federal government on Friday.
