Introduction
Welcome to Recruiting Realities, your weekly dose of all things hiring! Today, we’re diving into the juicy details of the March 2025 US jobs report with our in-house labor market guru, David Garrett! We’ll break down the surprising job gains, the slight bump in unemployment, and how factors like government workforce reductions and the unpredictable world of tariffs are shaking things up for the job market. Get ready for some eyebrow-raising insights!
Yazad Dalal: Hi everyone, I’m Yazad Dalal, chief growth officer here at Joveo and welcome to recruiting realities where we bring to you the latest developments and insights in recruitment. Today we’re speaking again with our own in-house labor market economist David Garrett about the US jobs report for March 2025. Hello David.
David Garrett: Howdy. How’s it going?
Yazad Dalal: And for our listeners at Joveo, we publish interactive insights across all major occupations in the US. You can check that out on our website, joveo.com/interactive-insights.
David, the most recent US jobs report came out for the month of March. The US labor market added an estimated 228,000 jobs, well above most economists’ expectations and rebounding downward from or sort of upward from the revised gains that were reported in February and January. But the unemployment rate continued to trend upwards to 4.2% from 4.1 in February. So there’s a bit of an up and down there. Across sectors, we saw continuing gains in healthcare, social assistance, transportation and warehousing, retail, construction. Overall, the private sector gained 209,000 jobs overall.
And in Joveo’s own data, we continue to see increasing volumes of postings for nurses, in particular, travel nurses. While at the same time, our clients are spending 66% less per nursing application than they were 2 years ago. So, David, I have lots of questions. Let’s get started. First of all, what were your key takeaways from this latest report?
David Garrett: Yeah, I mean, it was a weird one. March saw incredibly high job numbers even though it also saw the highest announced job cuts since the pandemic, around 275,000 layoffs. You know, and of course, 80% of them were from the federal government because of their workforce reduction initiative. As you mentioned, healthcare remains stable. But transportation saw its biggest monthly gain in three years partly due to companies preparing for the, you know, these tariff changes. You know and much of the transportation boost also came from couriers where there was a resolved labor dispute and you know they also have this sort of countercyclical demand surge. Meanwhile retail gained roughly 24,000 most of these from workers also returning from strikes in the food and beverage sector.
Yazad Dalal: And I think the word of the year is probably going to be tariffs, especially the unpredictability. Where will they finally land? Talk to us a little bit about the impact of tariffs on manufacturing, on agriculture, and hourly roles.
David Garrett: Yeah, I mean you know, I saw Moody’s analytics report that, if the tariffs remain, the US could lose between 250 to over 300,000 jobs this year. Manufacturing, agriculture, retail, construction, they’re all very vulnerable sectors who will face higher costs. Likely more disrupted supply chains and additionally weaker demand as consumers are paying more for just basic goods. This will lead to higher time to fill higher cost per hire and things like that.
Yazad Dalal: Well I think that’s a lot to digest. Thank you very much David and thank you to our listeners. Don’t forget to visit us at joveo.com and we’ll see you again soon.
Conclusion
This episode wrapped up with a look at the mixed signals – robust job growth, but also a surge in layoffs, largely due to government cuts. The big question mark? Those tariffs! We discussed how they’re set to throw a wrench into manufacturing, agriculture, and hourly roles, potentially leading to higher costs and longer hiring times. It’s definitely a lot to chew on for what’s ahead!
