Employers hired new workers but remained more cautious, another indication that a larger number of companies are keeping their expansion plans on hold in the face of economic uncertainty caused by President Trump.

The economy added 73,000 July 2025 U.S. jobs report, the Labor Department said on Friday, well below economists’ expectations. The 4.2% unemployment of unemployment from 4.1 percent a month earlier.

Revisions to the previous two months’ jobs data also showed that the labor market drop as initially thought earlier this year. Job gains for June and May were each revised down by a combined 258,000, a large number for revisions to be negative for two straight months.

The labor market has so far remained resilient this year. But the downward revisions to the pace of weak payroll growth signal that cracks in the job market are widening. Economists have been warning that disorderly tariff policies, immigration curbs and layoffs in the federal government could weigh on growth.

“I think we’re looking at and labor market slowdown that’s not absolutely falling off a cliff, but it’s getting materially weaker,” Oliver Allen, a senior U.S. economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said in an email.

Just before the release of the official jobs data, two Fed rate cut prospects officials who dissented on interest rate policy this week from the other nine policymakers released statements on their respective votes.

“Michelle W. Bowman, the Federal Reserve’s vice-chair for supervision and a Trump appointee, said the labour market is showing less dynamism and some signs of softening. She said waiting too long to cut interest rates could harm labour market conditions and further slow economic growth,” according to Reuters.

Christopher Waller, another Trump appointee, said waiting to cut rates was too conservative. “There is no reason to keep rates unchanged and risk a sharp deterioration in the job market,” Waller said.