Inside The ADP Jobs Report - August 2021
Bottom Line: The summer surge of COVID-19 cases seems to have taken its toll on the summer surge of hiring that’d previously been taking place. July produced mediocre job gains in the private sector. This is especially notable when considered against the backdrop of 25 states, including Florida, having dropped the extension of federal unemployment benefits - which led to an increase in those looking for work in June and with more job openings than those looking for work in Florida and across the country.
According to the ADP Report reflecting the growth in private sector jobs in July, there were 330,000 private sector jobs added. That included...
- Small businesses: +91,000
- Midsized: +132,000
- Large: +106,000
The good news, to the extent we had some in this report, is that the gains were across the board. While small business gains were smallest, they weren’t far off of the pace of larger companies and importantly they didn’t stop altogether. With small businesses being the most economically sensitive, if we were at risk of a double-dip recession we’d see it show up in small businesses hiring numbers first. Small businesses are leading economic indicators and typically are only hiring when the real-time demand is there to necessitate it.
Here were the top industries for hiring in July:
- #1: Leisure and Hospitality
- #2: Education & Health
- #3: Professional & Business Services
No change in the trends last month. The top three industries for hiring in June were the same in July. Ditto the one industry that shed jobs. For the second straight month information jobs were lost. It’s consistently been the weakest for job growth in 2021. The news wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad either. Going forward a lot hinges on the surge in the Delta variant and how both consumers and governments react to it. Tomorrow we’ll get the full jobs picture with government jobs added in. More to come...