The economy added 372,000 jobs in June, a warmer-than-expected boost in the labor market that may ease concerns about an impending recession, but which also complicates the work of the Federal Reserve as it seeks to stifle inflation.
The unemployment rate was 3.6 percent, the same as a month earlier, the Department of Labor said Friday.
The figure is in line with the average gain in recent months, including 368,000 in April and 384,000 in May. Employers have continued to compete for workers in recent months, and initial unemployment claims have only risen slightly from their lowest point in March.
The private sector has now regained its pre-pandemic number of jobs, while the public sector remains at 664,000 jobs below February 2020. Apart from the public sector, no industry lost jobs in the pandemic. June, in a seasonally adjusted manner.
There is no guarantee that rapid growth will continue indefinitely, however, as very high prices weigh on consumer spending. The workforce remains limited by aging demographics, low levels of immigration, and barriers to employment that keep many people on the sidelines.
“We weren’t going to keep up the job growth we had seen, we had to stop,” said Julian Richers, Morgan Stanley’s vice president of global economic research. He said, however, that it would take a while to exhaust the U.S. hunger for work.
“There is still a lot of accumulated demand for workers,” Dr. Richers. “It makes sense that as the economy slows, employment should also slow down, once we have overcome the backlog of labor demand.”
This lag is evident in the 11.3 million jobs employers had open in May, a figure that remains close to all-time highs and leaves nearly two jobs available for every job seeker. In this equation, it is likely that any laid-off worker as certain sectors get into trouble will find new jobs quickly, at least for a while.
But a number of headwinds are creating a time limit in this vendor’s job market. Business leaders report that while domestic demand remains strong and some supply chain problems have eased, late orders are no longer growing and savings accounts are shrinking. Whenever possible, employers automate tasks instead of hiring new employees.
“Employers are less and less eager to fill these job offers as they see the economy slow down,” said Bill Adams, chief economist at Comerica Bank. “I would expect companies to probably slow down by filling open positions before they actually get job offers.”