The labor market remained sound in March, with job openings declining but layoffs remaining near record lows, while rates of new hiring were slow but steady, according to data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Tuesday.
The numbers from last month are a snapshot of the state of the U.S. economy and labor market before the start of the global trade volatility brought on by President Trump’s tariff campaign.
“It reflects a labor market that ‘could have been,’ given the damage tariffs will do,” argued Guy Berger, the director of economic research at the Burning Glass Institute, which studies the labor market. “We have the foundations of a labor market stabilization,” he added, “but trade policy has other ideas.”
The prevailing environment before April of subdued hiring and few firings was not an easy one for active job seekers, especially in certain sectors like tech and manufacturing. But the stability of the overall job market was undeniable — so much so that some labor economists started to worry that the conditions bordered on stagnant.
Now, the economy is facing a radically different set of challenges.
Consumer sentiment has plunged since January, when the import taxes were announced by the White House, as fears of both job loss and higher inflation have surged among households and top business leaders.
The effects of the tariffs on shipping have not yet been fully felt. But experts in global freight logistics, such as Craig Fuller, the founder of FreightWaves, expect that to change in the coming days and weeks as companies face tariffs ranging from 10 percent to well over 120 percent on many Chinese goods.
Federal job openings declined by 36,000 in March, a result of the Trump administration’s steep cutbacks to the federal civil service. And in the overall labor market, job openings fell by 288,000. Some financial analysts are focused on a broader, monthslong pre-tariff slowdown.
“The main story is that job openings are down,” said Neil Dutta, the head of economics at the research firm Renaissance Macro. “We are at the point where opening declines push up unemployment.”
The jobs report for April will help fill out some of the economic picture. Economists expect unemployment to have been largely unchanged and for moderate job growth to have continued. But forecasters are bracing for surprises because of the uncertainty surrounding the tariffs.
The employment picture and consumer spending remain bright for now — a point that U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has emphasized in his public remarks.
But many analysts, including Daniel Altman, the chief economist at Instawork, a job search and recruitment site, are in wait-and-see mode.
“I think the jobs report will be more revealing,” Mr. Altman said.
Talmon Joseph Smith is a Times economics reporter, based in New York.
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