Name: Latest jobs report is 'ugly' across the board: Analyst
Uploaded: 2026-03-06T23:01:31.000Z
Duration: 4 min 54 s
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Past perfect

Bureau of Labor Statistics keep in mind says the US economy lost 92,000 jobs last month, far below the gain of 50,000 jobs experts had predicted.

No doubt also impacting those market numbers.

Bankrate senior economic analyst Mark Hamrick is here with more on this morning's job numbers.

So this jobs report is much worse than expected.

And 50,000 is already a pretty low estimate.

So what stands out to you when you look at these numbers?

This is an ugly jobs report across the board.

Very often we'll have a report that might be on the one hand, on the other hand, and

one hand might have something that is more positive.

You don't really see that in this report.

On the headline number of payrolls, you see there 92,000 jobs in the hole last month.

We now have average monthly jobs creation last year of fewer than 10,000 jobs a month.

And you go back to June of last year, this isn't just a one month phenomenon.

June of last year you basically had one month of jobs creation followed by a month of contraction in payroll.

So the unemployment rate has essentially hung in there.

that's about nearly a full percent above the low that we saw in recent years.

The question is, are we losing, you know, momentum with the job market and is there a risk?

The unemployment rate goes higher since this report was gathered, which is typically around the 12th of the month of February.

And we see higher prices emanating from energy, first of all, which ultimately do filter on through the rest of the economy.

Average price per gallon of gas in this country up 34 cents basically in a week.

And so this is affecting everything from airline fares to mortgage rates.

We've heard layoff announcements from companies like Block and Amazon saying they're using AI to make their workforces more efficient.

Do you see that trend reflected in this jobs report?

We see the information sector losing about 10,000 jobs here.

The Block announcement has since been questioned in the sense of are we seeing something?

Remember years back when sort of pivoting to environmental concerns was called greenwashing, using that as sort of an excuse?

Some people think this is a washing in the block sense because the company had expanded so aggressively and now has to cut back so That's a question mark.

But obviously AI is being integrated across the economy where appropriate.

But it's also adding momentum for the economy in the sectors that are relevant data centers.

The expenditures on artificial intelligence, of technology, really representing the lion share of business capital investment in this country.

If we didn't have that, GDP probably would have been negative or certainly much lower.

I think it's way too early to say that AI is killing all the jobs, but

it's worth watching and it's obviously going to be a conversation.

You say uncertainty and volatility are inescapable right now.

Well, it's been that way for almost a year now.

The question is, what is it that is the source of that at any given moment?

They also sort of got a new lease on life after the Supreme Court decision.

As we've seen, that escalation from 10% to 15% using the new authority the president's turning to, part of it has to do with technological change, the rapid changes in the economy, globalized economy, as well as the geopolitical sphere.

So volatility, disruption, uncertainty, those are not going to leave us.

Affordability is a major issue for Americans right now.

Triple A reports the situation in the Middle east has caused the national average for gas prices to jump about 34 cents in a week.

What other impacts do you think a prolonged war could have on the economy?

Well, first of all, it really aggravates the affordability challenge that in first and foremost in the pocketbooks and minds of Americans for several years now.

So there is a risk that inflation goes from too high to even higher.

We don't know whether there are wider impacts.

But the longer crude oil prices stay higher, the longer gasoline prices stay higher, those are going to filter on through the economy because we're reliant on transportation for so many things, and