U.S. Labor Market Begins 2026 Stronger Than Expected After 2025’s Weakness

Hiring among U.S. employers picked up in January, exceeding expectations. According to a survey of businesses by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), U.S. employers added 130,000 jobs in January 2026, the strongest monthly jobs report since December 2024. This strength followed a year of notably weak job gains that were even worse than initially reported, due to recent BLS revisions. January job additions were well above the 48,000 jobs added in December 2025 following a downward revision of 2,000 jobs. In addition, the January jobs report soared past economists’ expectations of a gain of roughly 55,000 to 75,000 jobs. Six of the 11 major industries added jobs in January, with the largest increases in the Education/Health Services (+137,000 jobs) sector, followed by Professional/Business Services (+34,000 jobs), Construction (+33,000 jobs), Other Services (+7,000 jobs), Manufacturing (+5,000 jobs) and Leisure/Hospitality Services (+1,000 jobs). Notable job losses were seen in Government (-42,000 jobs) and Financial Activities (-22,000 jobs). Other major industries losing jobs during the month were Information (-12,000 jobs), Trade/Transportation/Utilities (-9,000 jobs) and Mining/Logging (-2,000 jobs). Meanwhile, the unemployment rate (U3 or headline unemployment rate, which is seasonally adjusted, and is a survey of households) has edged down for two consecutive quarters, landing at 4.3% in January. That was down from the December rate of 4.4% but above the year-earlier rate of 4% and fell in line with the U.S. average of 4.4% from 2015 to 2019.

This post is part of a series analyzing employment data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For more on this data, read previous posts on Job Growth.