The US economy added a stronger-than-expected 147,000 jobs in June and the unemployment rate fell to 4.1%

By Alicia Wallace, CNN
(CNN) — The US job market continues to chug along, despite heightened uncertainty about the economy and how President Donald Trump’s tariffs could shake out.
The economy added a stronger-than-expected 147,000 jobs in June, and the unemployment rate ticked down to 4.1% from 4.2%, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data released Thursday.
Last month’s gains, which landed above expectations for 117,500 jobs to be added, marked a slight increase from May’s total, which was revised up slightly (5,000 jobs) to 144,000. April’s job gains were revised higher by 11,000 jobs, for a net gain of 158,000.
Those revisions and Thursday’s data bring the three-month average job growth to 150,000.
However, despite the continuation of fairly solid monthly employment gains, Thursday’s jobs report once again showed some fissures within the labor market.
Notably, job growth is not widespread. The vast majority of the month’s gains were in health care, leisure and hospitality, and state and local government.
The labor force participation rate ticked down, while the unemployment rate for Black workers surged by 0.8 percentage points to 6.8%, its highest rate since January 2022.
The household survey, one of two that feed in to the monthly jobs report, often can have volatile monthly swings; however, rising unemployment levels for Black workers has in the past served as an indicator of economic weakness.
Stock futures jumped higher after the report. Dow futures gained 133 points, or 0.3%. S&P 500 futures also rose 0.3% and Nasdaq 100 futures gained 0.35%.
Trump has introduced a bevy of sweeping policies that have the potential to impact the economy. However, questions around how those actions will shake out — particularly the size and scope of tariffs — have heightened uncertainty and hampered hiring activity, to some extent.
For several months running, the labor market has been in a state of low churn: Hiring activity is at near 10-year lows and workers aren’t feeling confident enough to quit; however, employers, for the most part, are holding on to the workers they have.
Layoff activity hasn’t accelerated recently, according to a variety of indicators, including weekly jobless claims data.
On Thursday, the latest batch of claims data showed that first-time filings for unemployment insurance — considered a proxy for layoffs — decreased to 233,000 for the week ended June 28 from 237,000 the week before, according to a separate report released by the Department of Labor.
While first-time claims aren’t steadily on the rise, people appear to be having a harder time finding work when they’re unemployed.
Continuing claims, which are filed by people who have received jobless benefits for at least one week, have been butting up against three-and-a-half-year highs.
That was the case during the week that ended June 21 (the continuing claims data runs at a lag): The number of continuing claims was unchanged at 1.964 million.
This story is developing and will be updated.
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