The unemployment rate dipped to 3.6 percent and the U.S. added 209,000 jobs in June, falling just short of the 240,000-job gain projected by economists.
The U.S. has added an average of 278,000 jobs per month this year, down from 399,000 per month in 2022 but well above the level needed to keep the economy growing.
Steady wage growth and stable labor force participation are also flying in the face of recession predictions.
The U.S. economy is doing far better now than many experts predicted it would when the Federal Reserve began hiking interest rates last year.
Countless forecasts of a 2023 recession have failed to materialize, all while inflation has fallen from an annual rate of 9.1 percent in June of last year to 4.1 percent this past month.
Economists and policymakers are more optimistic that the U.S. can achieve a “soft landing” from the high inflation and rapid growth seen after the COVID-19 recession without a recession.
“The labor market is holding up very well, but it’s not on fire,” wrote Dave Gilbertson, labor economist at UKG, in an analysis.
“This level of job growth might not blow the doors off, compared to May, and that’s good. There is no cause for alarm over this decrease.”
Even so, there were some signs of deeper trouble in the job market that economists will closely watch as the year unfolds.
The number of people working part-time due to economic conditions rose by 452,000 to 4.2 million in June.
This reflects “an increase in the number of persons whose hours were cut due to slack work or business conditions,” the Labor Department said.
Black unemployment also jumped to 6 percent from 4.7 percent in April.
Some market commentators think of this demographic as a “canary in the coal mine” for potential job losses throughout the economy.
The Hill’s Tobias Burns breaks down the jobs report here.
