By Joshua Kirby


Hiring in the U.S. private sector picked up more pace than expected last month while wage growth stayed steady, pointing to continued resilience in the jobs market that could keep inflation running high.

Employment in the nonfarm private sector rose by 184,000 jobs in March, surging from 155,000 in February and by the largest amount since July of last year, according to the ADP National Employment Report published Wednesday. Economists polled by The Wall Street Journal had expected a rise of 155,000 jobs.

Wage growth meanwhile rose at an average 5.1% over the month among job-stayers, the same rate as in February. Job-changers meanwhile saw an average 10% leap in wages.

"March was surprising not just for the pay gains, but the sectors that recorded them. The three biggest increases for job-changers were in construction, financial services and manufacturing," said Nela Richardson, chief economist at ADP. This suggests pay is heating up in both goods and services, posing a challenge to policymakers hoping to see inflation cool sustainably.

Services again added the most jobs, led by leisure and hospitality. But goods-producing industries including construction and mining also added thousands of jobs. The only sector to lose posts was professional services.

By region, the South added the most jobs at 91,000, while the Northeast added the fewest at 20,000. New England was the only subregion to book a slight downtick in jobs numbers.

The ADP estimate is based on aggregated payroll data of more than 25 million U.S. workers and is independent from Labor Department official data. Pay data is based on the salaries of almost 10 million individual employees over a 12-month period.

Official employment figures from the Labor Department will be published Friday. Economists expect the report to show continued robustness in the labor market in March, albeit slackening a little from February's bonanza of 275,000 new jobs.


Write to Joshua Kirby at joshua.kirby@wsj.com; @joshualeokirby


(END) Dow Jones Newswires

04-03-24 0853ET