After a grim year, employers are once again optimistic about hiring

A year ago, talk of a jobless recovery dominated discussion as Massachusetts and the nation slowly climbed out of a deep recession. Economists are painting a brighter picture for 2011, anticipating solid job growth in the last six months of this year and predicting an economic recovery that actually feels like one.

Already, there are signs of improvement. Nationally, first-time claims for unemployment benefits have fallen to two-year lows in recent weeks while advertised job openings have reached their highest level since August 2008, according to the Labor Department. US employers have added jobs in each of the past three months, while the national unemployment rate last month fell to 9.4 percent from 9.8 percent in November.

In Massachusetts, job vacancies are up, and businesses are optimistic about hiring over the next several months, according to the business confidence survey of Associated Industries of Massachusetts, the state’s largest employers group. Staffing firms point to another sign that employment is likely to expand in the state: Companies are hiring more recruiters.

“It’s getting better slowly,’’ said Alan Clayton-Matthews, a Northeastern University economics professor, “but the end of 2011 will look a lot better than the end of last year.’’

Clayton-Matthews and other economists caution that it will take years for unemployment to return to prerecession levels. When the downturn began three years ago, Massachusetts employers slashed jobs by the tens of thousands and the state unemployment rate rose rapidly, more than doubling before peaking in January 2010 at 9.5 percent, a 33-year-high.

Last year, the picture improved, though not on a grand scale. Through the first 11 months of 2010, the state added about 38,000 jobs, and unemployment fell to 8.2 percent. First-time claims for jobless benefits in November declined 16 percent from a year ago.

Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight in Lexington, forecasts that unemployment in Massachusetts will fall to as low as 7.8 percent this year. Employers confident in an improved outlook will hire, and business tax incentives recently enacted by Congress will encourage growth. Consumer spending will also rebound, he said. “It’s interesting,’’ said Behravesh. “Just in a matter of a few weeks, not only has all the talk about a double-dip [recession] disappeared, but things are starting to look much more upbeat.’’

After slashing costs and payrolls over the past few years, businesses may be reaching the point at which they must hire to meet increasing demand and continue to grow, economists said. Additionally, the diminished value of the dollar in other countries should lower the costs of US goods and services, and further increase demand for them — and for new workers. Many Massachusetts firms sell products overseas.

“The tinder is there to be receptive to the spark,’’ Clayton-Matthews said. “Businesses have a lot of cash on hand. They have a lot of money to expand operations once they’re confident the economy is going to come back.’’

Several Massachusetts sectors added jobs over the last year, and hiring in them is expected to continue. Education services, which include colleges and universities, for example, increased employment 7.2 percent between November 2009 and November 2010, the most recent data available. Professional, scientific, and technical services, which include a variety of technology and research firms, increased more than 2 percent during the same period. Health care jobs increase about 1 percent.

Scott Ragusa, president of contract businesses at Winter, Wyman Cos., a Waltham staffing firm, said the number of job openings at companies with which his firm does business has doubled from the end of 2009 with demand especially strong for workers with technological expertise and computer language skills. The number of job seekers Winter, Wyman placed in permanent jobs rose 22 percent.

“We’re much busier this season than last season,’’ Ragusa said. “And as January picks up, we expect a growing demand.’’

Elaine Varelas, a regular contributor to the Globe and managing partner at Keystone Associates, a firm that offers career assistance to laid-off workers, also sounded upbeat about hiring in the coming year.

Layoffs have been steadily slowing since 2008, she said, and that trend will likely continue because smart executives know they cannot simply cut their way to prosperity.

“You need to invest your way out of a recession,’’ she said.

Megan Woolhouse can be reached at mwoolhouse@globe.com.