Americans’ gloomy feelings about the job market are now showing up in the data.
The U.S. economy added just 73,000 nonfarm jobs in July, according to the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) report. That’s weaker than economists expected and falls below the roughly 80,000 jobs per month that are generally needed to keep up with population growth, says Laura Ullrich, director of economic research for North America at Indeed.
The picture looks even worse after the government revised May and June numbers sharply downward. Instead of the 291,000 jobs initially reported for those months combined, the revised figure shows only 33,000 jobs were actually added—a massive correction.
Following the disappointing report, President Donald Trump fired BLS commissioner Erika McEntarfer, claiming without evidence that the report had been “rigged” by federal workers. Economists note, however, that revisions like these are routine as the agency gathers more payroll data.
“These revisions took prior reports from looking like healthy job growth to looking quite weak,” Ullrich said.
The data confirms what many workers already feel: the U.S. labor market is slowing sharply. Here’s what job seekers should know.
Health Care Is Carrying the Job Market
At the start of the year, three sectors were responsible for most new jobs: health care and social assistance, leisure and hospitality, and government hiring.
Now, leisure and hospitality is slowing as businesses pull back in the face of economic uncertainty, and government hiring has fallen amid Trump administration efforts to shrink the federal workforce.
Health care, however, is booming. The sector made up nearly 49% of all job growth in the past year despite representing just 15% of the economy. Hospitals added 196,000 jobs in the last year, a 3.5% increase, while home health services added nearly 57,000 jobs, up 3.2%.
Most of these roles—nurses, nursing assistants, patient care techs, and home health aides—are filled by women. In fact, 35% of all U.S. employment growth over the past year came from women in health care and social assistance.
This growth isn’t surprising: experts have long predicted that the aging Baby Boomer population would drive demand for health-care workers.
White-Collar and Industrial Jobs Are Struggling
By contrast, sectors that usually offer high-paying jobs—professional and business services, manufacturing, and government—each lost over 10,000 jobs in July.
Some economists are calling it a “white-collar recession,” with office workers bearing the brunt of the slowdown. Business and professional services boomed after the pandemic, but hiring has been soft for more than a year now.
Manufacturing jobs are also under pressure, though the causes are less clear. Possible factors include new tariffs, shifting consumer habits, and general economic uncertainty.
Signs of a Tougher Job Market
The number of Americans unemployed for 27 weeks or longer rose by 179,000 to 1.8 million in July, meaning one in four job seekers is now long-term unemployed.
Job postings on Indeed are also down, and many workers are struggling to match their skills to the sectors that are still hiring.
“If you’re looking for a job in manufacturing or business services, it’s a tough market,” Ullrich says. “If you’re a new nursing graduate, there’s likely someone ready to hire you.”
In short, the labor market is cooling quickly—and for many Americans, it already feels like winter.