By Josh Schafer

Image illustration by Yahoo finance

The January jobs report is expected to show hiring slowed to start 2025 while the unemployment rate was flat.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics' monthly jobs report is slated for release at 8:30 a.m. ET on Friday. Economists expect non-farm payrolls to have risen by 170,000 in January, while the unemployment rate held steady at 4.1%, according to consensus estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

In December, the US economy added 256,000 jobs, far above economists' expectations. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate decreased to 4.1% from 4.2% the month prior.

“Amidst all the tariff jitters, the January jobs report will likely send a comforting signal about the health of the economy at the start of the year," EY senior economist Lydia Boussour wrote in a note previewing the event. "We expect nonfarm payrolls to increase a solid 190,000 — above consensus expectations for a 170,000 gain but a step down from the robust pace of job creation reported in December.”

Entering the release, investors don't see more than a 50% chance the Federal Reserve cuts interest rates until its June meeting, per the CME FedWatch Tool.

Here are the numbers Wall Street is expecting Friday, according to data from Bloomberg:

• Nonfarm payrolls: +170,000 vs. +256,000 previously

• Unemployment rate: 4.1% vs. 4.1% previously

• Average hourly earnings, month over month: +0.3% vs. +0.3% previously

• Average hourly earnings, year over year: +3.8% vs. +3.9% previously

• Average weekly hours worked: 34.3 vs. 34.3 previously

Recent data has shown the labor market slowing but not rapidly deteriorating, as layoffs remain low.

New data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics released Tuesday showed 7.6 million jobs were open at the end of December, a decrease from the 8.15 million in November. This marked the largest sequential drop in openings since October 2023.

But other signs of cooling within the report held steady. The Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) also showed the hiring rate was flat at 3.4%. Meanwhile, the quits rate, a sign of confidence among workers, was unchanged at 2%.

Data from ADP Wednesday morning showed 183,000 private payrolls were added in January, up from the 176,000 additions seen in December.

Largely, economists have argued the recent string of labor market data in the January jobs report has fit the "broadly stable" labor market narrative Fed Chair Jerome Powell described in his most recent press conference on Jan. 29.

"It's a low-hiring environment," Powell said. "So if you have a job, it's all good. But if you have to find a job, the job-finding rate, the hiring rates have come down."

Given Powell's recent confidence in the labor market, Jefferies US economist Tom Simons wrote in a note to clients, Friday's report likely won't be a game changer for the Fed.

"The employment data is always a risk event for the markets, but the data does not seem likely to alter the Fed's stance on monetary policy after Powell repeated that he and his colleagues were in "no hurry" to move forward with additional rate cuts," Simons wrote.

Josh Schafer is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. Follow him on X @_joshschafer.

Source: Yahoo finance