Payroll Revisions Could Cut 800,000 from Jobs Gains, or Not

Trusted Insights for What’s Ahead^®

• BLS payrolls currently show 2.9 million jobs added over the period between April 2024 and March 2024 (or 242,000 on average per month), a robust pace. However, the preliminary revision suggests that job gains were smaller at 2.1 million (or 173,000 on average per month).
• While representing a material change to payrolls, the preliminarily revised level would better align with other measures like household employment and JOLTS hiring rates.
• Even with the likely revision, payroll growth was healthy in 2023 and in Q1 2024 and Fed officials had posited that payrolls have been “overstated.”
• The downgrades do not alter the story of a gradual but sustainable labor market normalization, but do add to the growing evidence of softening signals in recent months.
• The final payroll revision in February 2025 may differ from this preliminary estimate, while dat