The US added 178,000 nonfarm jobs in March, a bigger-than-expected gain that followed months of mostly faltering job growth.
Payrolls were boosted by "one-time factors," including the end of a healthcare strike and "residual seasonality", Pantheon Macroeconomics chief US economist Samuel Tombs said in a note Friday. "The trend still looks weak."
The six-digit growth in payrolls, compared with analysts' estimates of about 60,000 gains, follows downwardly revised losses of 133,000 for February and upwardly revised gains of 160,000 for January, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) on Friday.
"The topline payroll number greatly overstates the prewar strength of the job market, and we forecast job growth to slow as the war begins to take a toll on real activity," Oxford Economics' lead economist Nancy Vanden Houten said in a note.
Total job growth for full-year 2025 was revised down to just 181,000 jobs from a prior 584,000, BLS reported in February.
Annualized average hourly earnings eased to 3.5pc in March from a 3.8pc gain in February.
Healthcare added 76,000 jobs in March, more than double the average of 29,000 added in the prior 12 months. Construction jobs added 29,000 in March while transportation and warehousing added 21,000 jobs in March. Leisure and hospitality added 44,000 jobs.
Manufacturing added 15,000 jobs last month but were down by 75,000 jobs from March 2025. Mining, quarrying and gas extraction added 1,300 jobs.
Federal government employment fell by 18,000 and was down by 355,000 since reaching a peak in October 2024. Jobs in financial activities fell by 15,000.
The unemployment rate edged lower to 4.3pc in March from 4.4pc in February. But the decline partly reflected a shrinking labor force, those counted as employed or looking for work.
The number of people marginally attached to the labor force, who had not looked for work in the prior four months after looking for a job sometime in the prior 12 months, rose by 325,000 to 1.9mn in March.
