US companies added 184,000 jobs in March, ADP data show

U.S. companies boosted hiring last month by the most since July in a broad advance and some wage gains accelerated, pointing to solid demand for workers.

Private payrolls increased 184,000 in March after an upwardly revised 155,000 gain a month earlier, according to figures published Wednesday by the ADP Research Institute in collaboration with Stanford Digital Economy Lab. The median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists called for a 150,000 increase.

Wage growth continued to accelerate for those who changed jobs, rising 10% from a year earlier in the largest advance since July. Workers who stayed in their job saw a 5.1% median pay bump in March from a year ago, unchanged from the prior month.

“Inflation has been cooling, but our data shows pay is heating up in both goods and services,” Nela Richardson, chief economist at ADP, said in a statement. The largest pay gains for job changers were in construction, financial services and manufacturing, she said.

The labor market has remained resilient in recent months, with healthy demand for workers and relatively low levels of unemployment. Federal Reserve officials have pointed to that strength, along with the need to see further progress on bringing down inflation, as a reason to hold off on cutting interest rates from their current two-decades high.

Job creation was broad, with the largest increases in leisure and hospitality, construction and trade and transportation. All regions posted gains, led by the South. The biggest advances were led by businesses with at least 50 workers.

The government’s monthly employment report due Friday is expected to show about a 215,000 gain in nonfarm payrolls, which include private- and public-sector jobs. That pace, the median estimate in a Bloomberg survey, would be the slowest since November, following three solid months averaging 265,000.