A roadside banner beckons potential employees outside Channel Control Merchants LLC, an extreme value retailer and exporter of brand sensitive secondary market inventories, in Hattiesburg, Miss., March 27, 2021. With hopes growing for a strong snapback in hiring this year, Friday, April 2 monthly jobs report will provide crucial insight into whether those sunny expectations will come true. The most optimistic economists are predicting the report could show a cool 1 million jobs were added in March. (AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis)
WASHINGTON (AP) — America’s employers unleashed a burst of hiring in March, adding 916,000 jobs in a sign that a sustained recovery from the pandemic recession is taking hold as vaccinations accelerate, stimulus checks flow through the economy and businesses increasingly reopen.
The March increase — the most since August — was nearly double February’s gain of 468,000, the Labor Department said Friday. The unemployment rate declined from 6.2% to 6%.
