What To Expect From Friday’s Jobs Report

• A highly anticipated government report is expected to show the job market grew steadily in April.

• Economists expect 133,000 jobs were added to the economy, but anything under six figures could indicate President Donald Trump’s tariffs are eroding the economy faster than forecasters had anticipated.
  

• Uncertainty about future tariff policy has forced businesses to postpone investments and hiring plans, weakening job growth.
  

A widely watched labor report expected this week could indicate whether President Donald Trump’s tariffs are hurting the job market.

A report on payrolls from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Friday is likely to show the U.S. economy added 133,000 jobs in April, according to a survey of economists by Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal. That would be a downshift from the unexpectedly high 228,000 added in March, but would be the second-highest pace of job growth all year. Economists expect the unemployment rate to stay at 4.2%, within the small range it’s maintained since last May, and not high by historical standards.

An unexpectedly low number of jobs added could signal that Trump’s tariffs are dragging down the economy faster than experts have been counting on. Numerous experts are bracing for slower hiring and an uptick in layoffs as a result of the tariff policies currently in place. Employers report they’ve put investments and expansions on hold and are waiting for the tariff policy to settle.

Few economists expect the April jobs data to show much movement, even though many of Trump’s levies took effect that month. His “Liberation Day” tariffs (announced April 2 and partially paused April 9) could have a particular effect, economists said.

“It will be extraordinary if employment is unscathed this year by the jump in tariffs on imports, the drop in asset prices and the extreme economic policy uncertainty, which likely is causing many businesses to defer non-essential spending,” Samuel Tombs and Oliver Allen, economists at Pantheon Macroeconomics, wrote in a commentary. “None of the coincident indicators of payrolls that we regularly track, however, have weakened decisively, yet.”

The jobs report will be the last in a week filled with economic data, including a report on the Gross Domestic Product, another on inflation, a survey on the manufacturing sector, and a survey of consumer confidence. Out of that batch, the jobs report could prove the most significant for the trajectory of the economy, and whether it’s headed for a recession anytime soon.

“If payroll jobs increase by 150k, give or take, which is the consensus, all the weak economic data released during the week will be forgotten, at least for a bit,” Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, posted on social media platform X. “Fingers crossed. But if employment increases by less than 100k, watch out.”