Is the job market hitting the brakes or just easing off the gas? Payroll giant ADP says U.S. employers added an average of 24,750 jobs per week over the four weeks ending September 26, according to a release distributed on PR Newswire. That is the latest reading of the ADP weekly jobs snapshot.
ADP’s own wording is that hiring “slowed” after five straight weeks of strengthening. Dramatic word. The numbers tell a gentler story.
How the ADP weekly jobs numbers actually moved
The weekly figure is called the NER Pulse. It tracks the change in employment using a four-week moving average, so no single week can swing it wildly. It is also seasonally adjusted and runs on a two-week lag.
Look at the recent run, as ADP reports it:
- Week ending September 5: 20,000
- Week ending September 12: 22,500
- Week ending September 19: 25,250
- Week ending September 26: 24,750
So the “slowdown” is a dip of 500 jobs per week from a revised peak. That is less a stumble than a shrug.
ADP first published the September 19 number as 23,750 on October 6, then nudged it up by 1,500. Measured against that original figure, the latest reading would have been a gain. Moral of the story: these numbers get edited after the fact.
Two jobs reports, two different moods
This is where it gets interesting. The monthly ADP jobs report, released September 30, said private employers added 90,000 jobs in September. Dr. Nela Richardson, ADP’s chief economist, called it “a strong report,” according to ADP’s release. Goods-producing jobs rose 31,000 and service-providing jobs rose 59,000, while financial activities and professional and business services each lost ground.
Then came the government’s version. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported just 29,000 nonfarm payroll jobs for September, well below forecasts. It also cut July to a loss of 10,000 jobs and trimmed August to 133,000.
Why the gap? The two reports measure different things. ADP counts private employers only, using payroll data from more than 26 million workers. The BLS counts all nonfarm payrolls from its own survey.
Different yardsticks, different answers, same economy.
The Pulse is a weekly average, so it is not directly comparable to either monthly total. Think of it as a speedometer rather than an odometer.
What the weekly hiring data means for your wallet
Here’s the thing: if you’re job hunting, asking for a raise or wondering whether to make a big purchase, the takeaway is a cautious one. Hiring is positive, but modest. In the weeks ADP highlights, employers were adding roughly 20,000 to 25,000 jobs per week, up from the 16,000-ish pace the Pulse showed over the summer.
That is not a boom. It is not a bust either. It is an economy that keeps hiring, just not with much swagger.
Pay is moving, too. ADP says base pay rose 3.2% over the year in September, while the BLS put average hourly earnings up 3.0%. Either way, paychecks are growing, just not by leaps and bounds. Families already feeling the pinch from rising costs, like the ones in our look at the bigger back-to-school bill, will notice every point.
The caveat on ADP weekly jobs nobody should skip
One more reality check: so far, ADP’s own release is the main source for this latest reading, and the figures are preliminary. ADP says they could change as more data comes in, and it has already revised a prior week. Treat any single ADP employment pulse reading as a snapshot, not a verdict. If you like to follow how data and trust shape a story, our piece on how science and regulation reset the peptide boom makes a similar point.
The next Pulse lands Tuesday, October 20. If it climbs back above 25,000, this week’s dip will look like a rounding error. If it keeps sliding, “slowed” will start to sound like the right word after all.
