The March jobs report showed the U.S. labor market remains strong, likely keeping the pressure on the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates in its efforts to slow inflation.
The U.S. economy added 236,000 jobs last month as the unemployment rate held steady at 3.5%, data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics released Friday showed.
Here are the key figures from the report, compared to last month's revised numbers:
Nonfarm payrolls: +236,000 vs. +326,000
Unemployment rate: 3.5% vs. 3.6%
Average hourly earnings, month-over-month: +0.3% vs. +0.2%
Average hourly earnings, year-over-year: 4.2% vs. +4.6%
In February, the economy added 311,000 new jobs while the unemployment rate rose to 3.6% amid an uptick in participation.
February's jobs report served as a firm-enough signal for the Fed to proceed with a planned interest rate hike. Those figures dropped just hours before Silicon Valley Bank was seized by regulators, however, with Signature Bank also closed by regulators two days later on Sunday, March 10.
Notable impacts from the bank crisis, however, weren't expected to feature in Friday's report.
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