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Employees added to half-million fewer jobs in 2018 and early 2019 than previously reported, the Labor Department said Wednesday.
The revisions, which are preliminary, are part of an annual process in which survey-based estimates are brought into line. Wednesday's review covers the period through March; final updates, which will include the rest of 2019, will be released in February.
The revisions do not change the overall picture of a healthy job market. But they do not mean that 2018, which was ranked among the strongest years of job growth in the decade-long recovery, was weaker than previously believed. After the revision, hiring probably averaged under 200,000 jobs last month, the 223,000 was reported and only added to the 179,000 monthly jobs added in 2017.
Wednesday's update is also the latest evidence that the economy has gotten off the ground by President Trump's tax cuts. Last month, the Commerce Department reduced its estimate of economic growth in 2018.
The revisions hit consumer-oriented industries particularly hard. Retailers cut nearly 150,000 more jobs than that reported, while hiring in leisure and hospitality – which includes restaurants, hotels and entertainment – was significantly weaker than believed. But the transportation and warehousing sector, which has been booming because of online shopping, added nearly 80,000 more jobs than previously reported.
Wednesday's review was the largest in recent years, but it did not come as a total surprise. Many economists had expected job growth in 2018 as the unemployed and struggled to find workers.
"The pace of job growth in 2018 was a significant upside surprise," said Stephen Stanley, chief economist of Amherst Pierpont Securities, an investment firm. "The revision kind of things back into line with what the original thought process had been."
Investors in recent weeks have come to the fore about the possibility of a recession, and the Federal Reserve is in an effort to stave off a downturn. Guy Berger, chief economist for the career-focused social network LinkedIn, said the recent revisions were a reminder that official statistics often struggle to pick up turning points in the economy until it is too late.
But Mr. Berger added that the evidence so far suggests that growth is cooling, not grinding to a halt.
"I do not look at any of these things and say, 'Wow, we're on the tip of a recession,'" he said.
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