{"id":29461,"date":"2026-08-06T05:48:33","date_gmt":"2026-08-06T00:48:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=29461"},"modified":"2026-08-06T05:48:33","modified_gmt":"2026-08-06T00:48:33","slug":"employers-are-hiring-less-but-paying-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=29461","title":{"rendered":"Employers are hiring less but paying more"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/images.axios.com\/XP8rbVglJZQKn2GbGFoVD7PblqY=\/1366x768\/smart\/2022\/12\/13\/162917-1670948957351.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Private employment data suggests that the labor market might be tighter than the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.axios.com\/2026\/07\/02\/jobs-report-labor-market-june\" target=\"_blank\">headline hiring numbers<\/a> alone suggest, with worker pay accelerating alongside lackluster jobs growth.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Why it matters: <\/strong>Employers are pulling back on hiring as they navigate an uncertain economic outlook, but supply constraints continue to limit the pool of available workers in some industries.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<ul>\n<li>That&#8217;s helping speed up pay growth \u2014 a boon for workers in industries like construction and health care, where employers are still competing for scarce labor.<\/li>\n<li>But the labor market is becoming increasingly uneven: While employers in some sectors are paying up to attract workers, others are more cautious about hiring as they contend with geopolitical uncertainty, tariffs and a more reluctant consumer.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>What they&#8217;re saying:<\/strong> &#8220;Pay is reflecting a labor market that is not getting looser, but maybe tightening a little bit. What you&#8217;re seeing is pockets of supply constraints,&#8221; ADP chief economist Nela Richardson told reporters Wednesday morning. <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;There is a mix of supply and demand drivers,&#8221; she added. That means &#8220;a strong month or a weak month may just be a short-term change in a hiring pattern, rather than a longer-term signal&#8221; about the labor market&#8217;s health.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>By the numbers: <\/strong>Private employers added just 44,000 jobs in July, down from 95,000 in June and the weakest monthly gain since January, according to ADP. <\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>But annual pay growth for workers who changed jobs accelerated to 7%, the fastest pace since August 2025, while pay for workers who stayed put held steady at 4.4%.<\/li>\n<li>Construction added just 1,000 jobs in July, but pay for construction workers changing jobs is at a record high, reflecting strong demand from AI-related data center construction and a limited supply of experienced workers, Richardson said.<\/li>\n<li>Education and health services led all industries with 36,000 new jobs last month. Even though pay growth there is not as eye-popping as it is in construction, it remains elevated as employers continue to compete for a limited pool of workers, Richardson noted.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>Between the lines:<\/strong> Other private-sector data shows that the labor market remains more resilient than the headline hiring figures alone suggest.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>The Bank of America Institute on Wednesday morning said its payroll gauge, based on customer deposit account data, accelerated to 2% year-over-year in July from 1.7% in June, with hiring strongest among lower-income workers.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>The intrigue:<\/strong> The bank also said that after-tax wage growth for lower-income households accelerated to 5.2% last month, surpassing pay growth of higher-income households for the first time since late 2024.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;This is a convergence, but it&#8217;s an upward convergence,&#8221; Bank of America Institute senior economist David Tinsley told reporters. &#8220;It&#8217;s not that everything is leveling down \u2014 it seems to be more of a leveling up in the data right now.&#8221; <\/li>\n<li>Tinsley said that<strong> <\/strong>the data points to &#8220;some evidence of tightening overall&#8221; in the labor market, as labor supply remains constrained and employers continue to compete for workers.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>The bottom line: <\/strong>Some employers are reluctant to hire, but persistent worker shortages are keeping wage pressures alive in key industries.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Tinsley said that firmer wage growth does not necessarily mean that the labor force is a source of inflationary pressure, noting that whether higher pay translates into inflation depends in part on productivity gains.<\/li>\n<li>ADP&#8217;s Richardson said that the pay growth pickup is worth watching, but &#8220;I don&#8217;t think that&#8217;s enough to tip into an inflationary cycle.&#8221; <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Private employment data suggests that the labor market might be tighter than the headline hiring numbers alone suggest, with worker pay accelerating alongside lackluster jobs growth. Why it matters: Employers are pulling back on hiring as they navigate an uncertain economic outlook, but supply constraints continue to limit the pool of available workers in some&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":29462,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/images.axios.com\/XP8rbVglJZQKn2GbGFoVD7PblqY=\/1366x768\/smart\/2022\/12\/13\/162917-1670948957351.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-political-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29461\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/29462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}