US employers added solid 151,000 jobs last month, the Labor Department reported Friday, March 7. Hiring was up from a revised 125,000 in January, but economists had expected 160,000 new jobs last month.

The unemployment rate rose slightly to 4.1% as the number of jobless Americans rose by 203,000.

Employment rose in healthcare, finance and transportation and warehousing. The federal government shed 10,000 jobs, the most since June 2022, though economists don’t expect Trump’s federal layoffs to have much of an impact until the March jobs report.

Hiring continued despite high interest rates that had been expected to tip the United States into recession. The economy’s unexpectedly strong recovery from the pandemic recession of 2020 set loose an inflationary surge that peaked in June 2022 when prices came in 9.1% higher than they’d been a year earlier.

In response, the Federal Reserve raised its benchmark interest rate 11 times in 2022 and 2023, taking it to the highest level in more than two decades. The economy remained sturdy despite the higher borrowing costs, thanks to strong consumer spending, big productivity gains at businesses and an influx of immigrants who eased labor shortages.

Inflation came down – dropping to 2.4% in September – allowing the Fed to reverse course and cut rates three times in 2024. The rate-cutting was expected to continue this year, but progress on inflation has stalled since summer, and the Fed has held off.