Final jobs report of 2025 shows 50,000 jobs added in December

The US economy added 50,000 jobs in December, according to Labor Department data published Friday, amid broader concerns about 2025’s cooling job market as out-of-work Americans struggle to land roles.

The unemployment rate declined to 4.4%, from 4.5% in November. A Bloomberg survey of economists had estimated a median gain of 70,000 jobs and a 4.5% unemployment rate in the final jobs report for 2025.

Read more: Worried about job security? Take these 5 steps to protect your finances. 

Revised data for November, meanwhile, showed a gain of 56,000 jobs rather than 64,000, the Labor Department said Friday, while revised data for October showed a loss of 173,000 jobs compared to the earlier reported decline of 105,000.

In all, monthly payroll growth for the year including December’s data averaged 49,000, Jed Kolko, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said in a post on X.

“That’s the slowest annual growth outside of recessions,” Kolko said. “Immigration policy slowed workforce growth, which has held back job growth.”

Questions continue to swirl about the state of the US job market as economists and workers alike grapple with a weak hiring rate and paltry job gains, but relatively low layoffs in what’s been described as a “no-hire, no-fire” economy. Americans are already feeling burdened by it: Consumers’ “perceived probability” of quickly landing work within three months of losing a job hit a record low in December, according to a New York Fed survey.

Indeed, the share of people who have been without a job for 27 weeks or longer as a percent of the unemployed population hit 26% in December, the highest since early 2022.

The monthly jobs report, it’s worth noting, is only just getting back on track after last fall’s shutdown-induced delays.