Keep the champagne corked on hiring gains in March.
Initial government estimates of job growth last month show employers added 178,000 positions in March, albeit heavily concentrated in a handful of industries that have regularly outperformed other sectors on the hiring front.
The unemployment rate dipped to 4.3% from 4.4% in February and a six-month peak of 4.6% last November, adding some margin to the Federal Reserve’s wait-and-see approach to interest rate policy for the remainder of 2026, amid fallout from the Iran war.
A strong headline jobs number “overstates the strength of this report,” said Mike Fratantoni, chief economist of the Mortgage Bankers Association, sharing his reaction to the updated Bureau of Labor Statistics data with ...