U.S. economy added 916,000 jobs in March

Recovery gaining steam as women reenter the workforce

The U.S. economy added 916,000 jobs in March, as coronavirus vaccine distribution improved, Congress approved a $1.9 trillion stimulus package, and states across the country lifted restrictions on businesses.

The unemployment rate edged down to 6 percent last month from 6.2 percent in February, according to the monthly report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The surge in hiring comes one year after the pandemic threw the U.S. economy into a tailspin, sending a signal that the recovery may have reached a turning point.

Economists hailed the report as a welcome sign that the country may finally be climbing out of the steep hole of jobs lost during the last year, now at a fast enough rate to see a full recovery by some point next year.

“This is a wonderful report. Hopefully we have many more months like it ahead,” said Nick

Bunker, the economic research director at Indeed, a jobs-listing service. “It’s fantastic to see the big bounce back in job gains.” At this rate, the labor market could see a full recovery by the middle of 2022, Bunker said.

The labor market lost 22 million jobs in March and April 2020. It recovered 12 million of those jobs over the next six months, but then the pace of rehiring slowed drastically as the virus began a Fall and Winter spike.

The new March data was the largest number of jobs added since August and the thirdstraight month of growth. The survey was taken the week of March 12, the same week that the stimulus package passed by Democratic majorities in the House and Senate was signed into law by President Joe Biden.

It could offer clues about the trajectory of the labor market in 2021.

Women, for example, who had left the workforce in droves earlier in the pandemic, are returning to the workforce in large numbers as schools have reopened in-person learning.

But the country is far from in the clear.

Long-term unemployment, those out of work for more than six months, remains a vexing problem as many job-seekers who lost their job early in the pandemic are still out of work a year later.

And the threat of the coronavirus cases rising again also hangs over the economy, said Drew Matus, chief market strategist for Metlife Investment Management. Many of the jobs added in March were driven by companies reopening as pandemic restrictions were lifted, he said.

In March, 492,000 women reentered the workforce as schools reopened for in-person learning, according to Labor Department data.