The U.S. economy isn't generating many jobs lately, but it might not need to

By Jeffry Bartash

The birthrate is falling. The population is aging. Immigration has ground to a halt. Unless something changes, the U.S. economy won't return to churning out hundreds of thousands of jobs each month.

The economy has alternated between adding jobs and losing jobs for 10 months in a row, and the on-and-off streak is likely to extend into March.

Yet the net result is all the same: The U.S. is barely creating any new jobs.

Here's what to watch for in the March employment report.

New jobs are no longer plentiful

Businesses and governments are expected to have generated 59,000 new jobs in March, partly reversing a 92,000 decline in February, according to economists polled by the Wall Street Journal.

The economy has added - and then lost - jobs in every month since May 2025, Bureau of Labor Statistics data show.

Add it all up, and the economy created just 34,000 net jobs during the 10-month span. That's the total, not a monthly average.

Get used to it. The U.S. birthrate is falling. The population is aging. Immigration has ground to a halt.

Until something changes, the economy is no longer going to churn out hundreds of thousands of new jobs every month.

Economists estimate the U.S. needs to add just 50,000 jobs a month, if that, to absorb the new entrants into the labor force. Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said the break-even rate could even be zero - or lower.

Strikes and weather

There is a chance we'll learn on Friday that job creation topped 100,000 in March, but that would almost certainly be a one-off.

For starters, some 30,000 jobs were subtracted from the February employment report because of nurses' strikes. Those jobs will be added back in March.

Harsh winter weather, meanwhile, almost certainly depressed hiring in February, even if the government's initial report didn't show much sign of it.

If there is a big employment increase, then the three-month average of job creation is a better guide for assessing the strength of the labor market. The three-month average was 36,000 in the last employment report.

Low unemployment

The unemployment rate is expected to hold firm at a low 4.4%. The jobless rate shouldn't change much, economists say, if the labor force isn't really growing.

The only way the unemployment rate would rise is if layoffs rose sharply - and there's no evidence of that - or the labor force started to grow again.

Higher labor-force participation would actually be good news for the job market.

In any case, the unemployment rate is now viewed as the best measure of the labor market's health, given what's expected to be a long-term slowdown in job creation.

Healthcare

The economy wouldn't be adding any jobs at all if not for healthcare, including social services such as eldercare and child care.

These providers created an average of 56,000 new jobs a month from February 2025 to February 2026.

By contrast, all other industries combined lost an average of 43,000 jobs a month during that span.

The current surge in healthcare hiring can't go on forever. Healthcare spending is projected to slow in 2026, J.P. Morgan analysts said, and reduce the demand for labor.

Healthcare unemployment has crept up since touching an all-time low in 2022.

-Jeffry Bartash

This content was created by MarketWatch, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. MarketWatch is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

04-02-26 1410ET