LoginThe economy added 119,000 private sector jobs during April 2013, according to the ADP National Employment Report. The new figures represent the weakest pace of growth in seven months.
"Job growth appears to be slowing in response to very significant fiscal headwinds," said Moody chief economist Mark Zandi. "Tax increases and government spending cuts are beginning to hit the job market. Job growth has slowed across all industries and most significantly among companies that employ between 20 and 499 workers."
Professionals services added 113,000 jobs during the time period, while goods production added only 6,000. The construction, trade/transportation/utilities and business/professional services industries were the top-three job creators, collectively responsible for 54,000 new positions. Manufacturing was the weakest sector, losing a total of 10,000 position.
Small and medium sized businesses (SMB) represented a majority of new private sector positions added during April. By contributing 50,000 and 26,000 jobs, respectively, they were collectively were responsible for 63 percent of job growth during the month.
Some analysts had predicted that ADP would report a gain of 192,000 private jobs and thus numbers were below expectations, according to Fox News. However, as ADP has been far-off in their estimations of private sector employment in the past, analysts are still not revising down their predictions for government labor figures due out later in the week.