The unemployment rate is surprisingly low, at 3.7%, shocking economists who expected a slowdown in hiring and rising unemployment rate. Frontline work, such as healthcare, led job growth. Frontline workers are in high demand, and the competition for their services is fierce. Yet wage growth cooled to 0.3%, the smallest rise since August 2021. That means employers are offering more jobs but not higher wages to attract staff, likely due to fears of a recession or at least an economic slowdown.

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