The February 2025 Jobs Report & January 2025 JOLTS: The Current U.S. Employment Situation

The BLS’s February 2025 U.S. job numbers are out: 151,000 jobs were added and the unemployment rate increased to 4.1%, close to economists’ expectations of 160,000 and 4% respectively. The number of unemployed people grew to 7.1 million.

The January 2025 JOLTS showed 7.7 million job openings, 5.4 million hires, and 5.3 million separations – not much change compared to December 2024’s numbers. The hires rate held at 3.4% and the quits rate increased slightly from 3.2% to 3.3%.

Here are additional highlights from the February 2025 jobs report and January 2025 JOLTS:

• The change in total nonfarm payroll employment for December 2024 was revised up by 16,000; January 2025’s total was revised down by 18,000.
• Average hourly earnings rose by $0.10 (0.3%) to $35.93.
• Job openings increased significantly in January within retail trade (+143,000) and financial activities (122,000); professional and business services saw a decrease of 122,000 job openings.
• The January 2025 JOLTS also included annual averages for 2024:
  • Job openings: 7.8 million
  • Hires: 65.3 million
  • Total separations: 63.2 million
  • Quits: 39.2 million
  • Layoffs and discharges: 20.2 million

Top industries hiring now include healthcare and social assistance, financial activities, transportation and warehousing, and construction. The BLS employment situation showed that leisure and hospitality employment declined by 16,000 last month; of note, strike activity (largely from workers at Kings Soopers-Kroger) contributed to employment decreasing in food and beverage retailers by 15,000.

We’ll have to wait a bit to see how tariffs, DOGE actions, and other recent changes will impact U.S. jobs data. As Ben Casselman of the New York Times put it, “Jobs reports are always backward-looking, in that they reflect data collected weeks earlier. But this one really feels like a look back at an earlier era, before all the disruptions of the past few weeks.”

Fortunately, you can stay ahead of the uncertainties with iHire. Our hiring resources and job search tools will help you meet your employment goals.