Slower pace of hiring in July, as US businesses add 185000 jobs

“Job growth is strong, but it has moderated since the beginning of the year”, said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, which produces the report along with ADP.

The private companies added 185,000 jobs in July, down from 229, 000 jobs in June, said the National Employment Report released jointly by Automatic Data Processing (ADP) and Moody’s Analytics, based on a monthly survey, Xinhua reported. In early U.S. trading on Wednesday, they were up 1% at $46.24 a barrel. Economists forecast it will show that employers added 225,000 jobs, and the unemployment rate held at 5.3 percent for the second straight month. The report is derived from ADP’s actual payroll data and it measures the seasonally adjusted change in total nonfarm private employment each month. Firms with 500 or more employees hired 64,000 workers last month, while medium-size businesses with payrolls of 50-499 workers added 62,000 employees. Service-providing employment rose by 178,000 jobs in July, down from 216,000 in June. The 10,000 new jobs added in financial activities was a drop from last month’s 16,000. Meanwhile, the manufacturing sector added 2,000 jobs much less than 9,000 in June. “Layoffs in the energy industry and weaker job gains in manufacturing are behind the slowdown”.

Payrolls for businesses with 49 or fewer employees increased by 59,000 jobs in July, half of the June number.

In the July ADP survey, hiring cooled off across industries. It is important to state that the Labour department would issue its official jobs report for July on Friday which would be closely watched by traders and investors to understand the underlying strength in the US labour market.