Quick Facts:
- Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 431,000 in March.
- Unemployment rate edged down by 0.2 percent to 3.6 percent.
- Notable job gains continued in leisure and hospitality, professional and business services, retail trade, and manufacturing.
- The number of unemployed persons edged down to 6 million.
- The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) decreased by 274,000 to 1.4 million.
- The number of job leavers – that is, unemployed persons who quit or voluntarily left their previous job and began looking for new employment – fell by 176,000 to 787,000 in March.
Looking Forward:
- U.S. job growth continued at a robust pace in March while the unemployment rate fell, as the Covid-19 pandemic’s grip on the labor market recedes and more workers return to the labor force.
- Inflation has eroded consumers’ spending power: Hourly pay, adjusted for higher consumer prices, fell 2.6% in February from a year earlier — the 11th straight month in which inflation has outpaced year-over-year wage growth. According to AAA, average gasoline prices, at $4.23 a gallon, are up a dizzying 47% from a year ago.
- Businesses are eager to onboard new employees and are raising wages in order to attract workers as they confront a labor shortage. There are roughly 11.3 million open jobs – the third-highest on record – while the pace of layoffs has moderated in recent months.
- Millions of workers are seeing the largest pay gains in years, as companies compete with one another for a limited number of employees: Wages climbed 5.6% in March from the previous year, nearly double the pre-pandemic average of 3%. Many of those gains have been eroded, however, by the highest inflation in nearly four decades that has pushed the price of everyday necessities like gasoline, clothing, and food significantly higher.
Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
