The U.S. jobs engine is sputtering and looks to be in danger of stalling out.
U.S. employers added just 22,000 jobs in August, according to a report Friday from the Labor Department. The unemployment rate inched up 4.3%. Revised figures also show there was also a net loss of jobs in June for the first time since 2020, in the midst of the pandemic.
The U.S. has now had four months in a row of pretty anemic job growth. Average job growth between May and August was down 75% from the same period a year ago.
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The weakness was visible all across the economy.
"There are not a lot of silver linings in the report," she economist Julia Coronado of Macropolicy Perspectives. "We are losing engines of job growth."
There was a net loss of jobs last month in manufacturing, construction, and oil drilling — all industries that the Trump administration is trying to promote.
A modest increase in health care jobs was partially offset by continued cuts in the federal workforce. The federal government has shed some 97,000 jobs since the beginning of the year, and government payrolls are expected to shrink further in the coming months when severance payments to employees who took buyouts end.
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This weak jobs report comes after President Trump abruptly fired the Labor Department official who oversaw the employment data after a similarly disappointing report a month ago.
Separately, the Labor Department reported that for the first time in more than four years, there are more people looking for work than there are job openings.
Weakness in the job market is likely to prompt the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates when policymakers meet later this month. Investors widely expect the Fed to cut its benchmark rate by a quarter percentage point.
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