Private payrolls rose by just 22,000 in January, far short of expectations, ADP says
Source: CNBC
Published Wed, Feb 4 2026 8:15 AM EST Updated 1 Min Ago
The U.S. labor market barely budged in January, with hiring below even muted expectations, according a report Wednesday from payrolls processing firm ADP.
Private companies added just 22,000 positions for the month and the number would have been negative had it not been for a surge of 74,000 hires in the education and health services category. The total was less than the downwardly revised 37,000 increase in December and below the Dow Jones consensus forecast for 45,000.
The report starts 2026 off on basically the same note where 2025 ended: A lackluster job market in a low-hire, low-fire environment that likely will do little to quell fears from Federal Reserve policymakers that more support may be needed.
Outside of the health care-related jobs, the primary driver behind employment growth last year, financial activities added 14,000 positions while construction rose by 9,000 and both the trade, transportation and utilities and the leisure and hospitality industries contributed 4,000. However, several sectors reported losses.
Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/2026/02/04/adp-jobs-report-january-2026.html
Since the government (BLS) is delaying this Friday's Unemployment report, the 3rd party ADP report (done monthly ahead of the government's) is about all we'll be getting as an indicator (and it only reports on the "private sector" jobs, not government, etc).
= new reply since forum marked as read
since they cover a narrow category of job categories that are "non-government", i.e., those in the "private sector" 
in a couple weeks - https://www.bls.gov/jlt/
That might show the huge ICE recruitment stuff (and ignore all the deferred government retirements and continued layoffs). 
