Another solid month of US hiring expected despite obstacles

By PAUL WISEMAN
AP Economics Writer

Defying a pandemic and supply chain disruptions, the U.S. economy has cranked out more than 400,000 jobs every month for nearly a year — a blazing winning streak in wildly uncertain times. And despite surging inflation, the hiring wave likely continued last month in the face of yet another jolt: Russia’s war in Ukraine, which has unsettled the economic outlook and catapulted gasoline prices to painful levels. Economists surveyed by the data firm FactSet expect the Labor Department’s jobs report for March to show that employers added an additional 478,000 jobs and that unemployment rate dipped from 3.8% to 3.7%.