Last week, the latest national employment data showed that the U.S. only added 57,000 jobs in June. This was a steep drop-off from the revised 129,000 jobs added in May and the 148,000 added in April. Despite the lower-than-expected numbers, the U.S. economy is still showing resiliency.
Part of the low employment in June could be due to the time of year. As children are on summer break from school, mothers often leave the workforce to care for them. This contributes to the slight decrease in women’s labor force participation rate, which dropped from 58.2% in May to 57.9% in June. These mothers often rejoin the labor force when school resumes.
Beyond the drop in employment in several sectors, some long-term growth industries are still seeing strong growth. Professional and business services added 36,000 jobs while the healthcare and social assistance industry added 46,600 jobs. While seasonality plays into the decline in sectors such as leisure and hospitality, healthcare and business services have continued to signal strength in key parts of the economy.
The leisure and hospitality sector has decreased by 61,000 jobs, and part of this could be due to a frontloading in hiring hospitality staff prior to the start of the FIFA World Cup. The tournament started in early June, so host cities likely hired more hospitality staff to accommodate the increased tourism. In fact, the leisure and hospitality industry saw an increase of 70,000 jobs in May. While summer may be higher for seasonal hiring in the hospitality industry, accommodating a huge increase in tourism across the country might have changed the pattern for this year.
Employment Down, but Economic Growth Up
Another recent sign of economic strength is the revised estimate for the U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP). In the third and final estimate for 2026 Q1, real GDP increased at an annual rate of 2.1%. This is 0.5 percentage points higher than the second estimate. The Bureau of Economic Analysis releases three estimates of GDP, each subsequent estimate reflecting more comprehensive data than the last. This final estimate reflects a downward revision to imports, which are subtracted from the GDP calculation.
In the first quarter of 2026, the industries that contributed to the increase in real GDP were information, federal government, professional, scientific, and technical services, and durable goods manufacturing. Despite a decrease in employment numbers in June, the information sector contributed a positive 0.69 percentage point to the total 2.1 percentage points that GDP increased.
Employment data provides a strong insight into the U.S. economy, but it is only a snapshot of the full picture. While one industry can be shedding jobs for several months, it still may be a big contributor to the country’s economic success.