The U.S. economy added nearly a million fewer jobs in 2024 and early 2025 than previously reported, sparking concerns that the labor market is weaker than it originally appeared.
The revision walks back much of the job growth reported during former President Joe Biden’s last few months in the White House and President Donald Trump’s first few months in office.
While numbers from a year ago indicate there was an overestimation the year prior that was lowered from about 800,000 to 600,000, this latest 12-month report is the largest negative revision on record, CNN noted.
In August, Trump fired Erika McEntarfer, the BLS commissioner appointed by Biden, after a disappointing July jobs report. Trump alleged McEntarfer faked job numbers ahead of the 2024 election to help former Vice President Kamala Harris with voters.
“We need accurate Jobs Numbers,” Trump wrote on Truth Social in August. “I have direct my Team to fire this Biden Political Appointee, IMMEDIATELY. She will be replaced with someone much more competent and qualified.”
Trump has yet to comment publicly about the jobs revision, but White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt released a statement arguing the numbers prove that Trump was right that “Biden’s economy was a disaster and the BLS is broken.”
“This is exactly why we need new leadership to restore trust and confidence in BLS’s data on behalf of the financial markets, businesses, policymakers, and families that rely on this data to make major decisions,” Leavitt said, reiterating that the administration wants the Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell to cut interest rates for the American people.
Vice President JD Vance took to social media to post about the data, and said BLS has become “useless.” He argued that a change was “necessary” to restore confidence in the agency.
Trump has nominated E.J. Antoni, the chief economist with the Heritage Foundation, to replace McEntarfer. He must be confirmed by the Senate to lead the BLS.
Leavitt addressed Antoni’s nomination and the jobs numbers during a press briefing Tuesday.
“We need truthful and honest data, which is why the president took the monumental step to try and appoint and confirm new leadership at the BLS so we can have data that we can actually rely on and that’s what the president has been doing, and we hope that his nominee will soon be confirmed,” she said.
BLS explains why numbers may have been wrong
Revised data was released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Tuesday and found more than 900,000 fewer jobs were reported in the 12 month period from March 2024 to March 2025.
BLS said the preliminary benchmark revision shows the difference between two independent employment counts, which are “each subject to their own sources of error.” Preliminary research found the overestimation on job creation is likely due to “two sources-response error and nonresponse error.”
For example, BLS said errors originated from businesses reporting less employment to the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, or QCEW, than they did to the Current Employment Statistics survey. Businesses that did not reply to the QCEW had lower employment during the 12-month period than those that did reply or could have overestimated the number of employees they were going to actually end up hiring.
According to BLS’s revisions, the leisure and hospitality industry and the professional and business services industry saw the largest change in the number of reported jobs.
The bureau said the benchmark revisions are likely to change, as it will be finalized in February 2026.