USA: nonfarm payrolls at 303 thousand in March and unemployment at 3.8%

The March report on nonfarm payrolls shows that in the last month the US labor market created 303 thousand new jobs. The figure is higher than the 214 thousand units expected, while the February survey was slightly revised downwards, from 275 thousand to 270 thousand.

The unemployment rate fell from 3.9% to 3.8%, in line with analysts’ estimates.

Growth in average hourly wages on a monthly basis was 0.3%, as expected, while on an annual basis it slowed from 4.3% to 4.1%, consistently with economists’ projections.