ADP reports private employers added 63K jobs, mostly in health and education

Amid everything else going on right now, there is also a big economic data release happening later this week — the jobs report. 

This week, there have been some privately-analyzed reports released. While not as thorough as the federal data, they can give some clues as to how the labor market is doing. The payroll processor ADP, for example, reported that private sector hiring jumped in February, adding 63,000 jobs. Pay was also up 4.5%, year over year.

Joe Brusuelas, chief economist at the consulting firm RSM, said that jobs data is really important.

“The unemployment rate, average hours worked, average hourly earnings, and what the median duration of unemployment is — those are really key factors to understand the health of the American economy,” he said.

Brusuelas said ADP’s numbers reaffirm a “low-hire, low-fire” labor market, and made him want to look closely at health care and private education in Friday’s jobs report.

“That's been the primary driver of hiring for the past several months,” he said.

David Tinsley, senior economist at the Bank of America Institute, said its February data also shows job growth.

“I think the story is a good one,” he said. “The jobs growth, at least at the start of this year, had some real momentum behind it.”

But, he said, there’s also a growing gap.

Higher-income households are seeing wage growth of more than 4%, year over year, Tinsley said, while lower-income households have a wage growth of below 1%. He said he’ll be looking for any indications of that in Friday’s data.

Kathy Bostjancic, chief economist at Nationwide, said she’s expecting modest job gains for February and will be watching for any revisions to January’s solid number. But…

“In terms of what consumers, businesses and investors are focused on, it's probably going to be overshadowed by what's happening in Iran,” she said.

And, Bostjancic said, it could also be eclipsed by the impact that oil and gas prices — or even just uncertainty — could have as the conflict continues.