The number of job openings in the United States was little changed at 9.55 million in September, notching a very slight increase from the month before.

The new figures, which look at openings across all sectors for that month, were released as part of the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, which was updated by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Wednesday. A slight decrease was expected after August’s JOLTS report, which showed openings jumped.

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The very subtle uptick signals that the Federal Reserve’s barrage of interest rate hikes is still not quite causing the country’s robust labor market to falter the way many expected. The high number of job openings could give the Fed, which is meeting this week, a little more leeway to keep rates higher for longer.

Despite overall declines in the number of job openings since last year, openings are historically high and above where they were before the pandemic, when the unemployment rate was at 3.5%. The unemployment rate ticked up to 3.8% in September but has largely hovered around that ultra-low 3.5% level most of the past year.

All eyes will be on Friday’s jobs report, which will outline the employment landscape from October and give new insight into how the economy is reacting to the Fed’s tightening.

The JOLTS report coincides with the Fed’s closely watched meeting. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell and top officials are huddling in Washington, D.C., to decide what to do with interest rates. Given lower (though still too high) inflation and strong recent economic growth, most economists expect the Fed to hold rates steady this week.

“No rate hike is expected,” Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate, told the Washington Examiner last week. “But I think we’ll otherwise hear a pretty familiar refrain — that the Fed is committed to price stability, that there still is a long way to go to get inflation to 2%, and that they will maintain the posture that allows them the flexibility to raise interest rates again if needed.”

There are fears that the Fed could overtighten and knock the economy into a recession.

Inflation in the consumer price index for the year ending in September held steady at 3.7%. On a month-to-month basis, inflation rose 0.4%, slightly higher than projected.

While the barrage of rate hikes, which began in earnest in March 2022, have not yet dealt serious damage to the labor market, they have caused pain for consumers.

Mortgage rates have soared to multi-decade highs in response to the Fed’s restrictive monetary policy.

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As of Tuesday, the average rate on a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage was 7.88%, according to Mortgage News Daily, which tracks daily changes in rates. Recently, mortgage rates peaked at 8.02%. The last time rates passed 8% was in 2000, according to separate records maintained by Freddie Mac.

In addition to making home purchases more expensive, the Fed’s tight monetary policy has also made interest-rate-sensitive things like paying off credit card debt more burdensome.