The U.S. economy added 162,000 jobs in August, with big gains in local government education and food services.
The U.S. Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released its monthly employment report on Friday, showing that the unemployment rate remained flat.
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The data far exceeded analysts’ expectations. The number of new jobs fell by 23,000 in July, but economists polled by Reuters had expected an increase of 56,000, the Wall Street Journal had expected an increase of 53,000, and Bloomberg had expected 55,000.
Local government education, or public schools, accounted for about 42,000 additional jobs as the 2026-27 school year begins in much of the United States. Teachers typically take a pay cut during the summer when school is out.
Food service employment also increased significantly, with 59,000 jobs added in August compared to the previous month.
Additionally, construction increased by 22,000 jobs, and healthcare increased by 12,000 jobs.
The information sector, which covers industries such as data processing, web hosting, publishing, broadcasting and telecommunications, lost 23,000 jobs, with layoffs at companies such as Scripps TV and Zillow that operate in those industries.
The financial activities sector, which includes industries such as insurance, commercial banking and real estate, lost 12,000 jobs.
mixed data
The data is in sharp contrast to the ADP National Employment Report, which tracks private payrolls and found that the overall U.S. economy added 38,000 jobs.
Meanwhile, the number of job openings in July changed slightly to 7.3 million from 7.2 million in the previous month, while total job separations decreased to 5.1 million in July from 5.3 million in June, according to the Labor Department’s Job Openings and Turnover Survey (JOLTS) report released on Tuesday.
The move to increase jobs comes ahead of a vote on interest rates at the Federal Reserve’s policy meeting scheduled for later this month. With the rise in employment, there is a 60% chance that the policy rate will rise by 25 basis points to 3.75%-4.00%, up from 49% on Thursday, according to CME Group’s FedWatch, which tracks possible monetary policy decisions.
US President Donald Trump was quick to comment on the jobs report and push for lower interest rates.
“US credit is much stronger than it was a while ago, so lower interest rates!” he said in a post on his social media platform Truth Social.
He also stepped up his threat to cut off trade with countries with which the United States runs deficits unless the central bank lowers interest rates.
Despite strong employment statistics, the US market is on the decline. Following Trump’s comments, the Nasdaq fell 0.2%, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.5% and the S&P 500 fell 0.3%.
Meanwhile, Canada released employment statistics amid ongoing trade tensions with the United States. According to Statistics Canada, Canada’s economy lost 41,700 jobs and the unemployment rate remained flat at 6.4 per cent.
“The economy will continue to struggle to create jobs in the near term, with increasing headwinds from new U.S. and Canadian tariffs, increased uncertainty from an escalating trade war, the ongoing Iran conflict and a declining population weighing on employment,” Tony Stilo, director of Canadian economics at Oxford Economics, said in a note provided to Al Jazeera.
