The Conference Board's U.S. employment trends index rose to a reading of 93.2 in January from 92.3 in December, the organization announced today. It's the fifth consecutive month of increases.

"The continued rise in the [employment trends index] makes us more optimistic that job growth will resume in the first quarter of 2010," said Gad Levanon, associate director of macroeconomic research at The Conference Board. "The improvement is widespread across all eight components. In particular, Friday's large decline in the number of involuntary part-time workers was the first time this component showed a strong signal of improvement."