Survey shows U.S. private sector hiring slows sharply in April

The U.S. private sector hiring slowed in April to the slowest pace in nearly a year and a half as energy and manufacturing companies continued to lay off workers, said a private survey released Wednesday.

U.S. private companies added 169,000 jobs in April, down from 175,000 in the previous month and the fewest since January 2014, said the National Employment Report released jointly by Automatic Data Processing (ADP) and Moody's Analytics, based on a monthly survey.

"April job gains came in under 200,000 for the second straight month," said Carlos Rodriguez, president and chief executive officer of ADP. "Companies with 500 or more employees had the slowest growth." In April, small- and medium-sized businesses accounted for most of the employment gains, adding 164,000 jobs, while large businesses with over 500 employees added only 5,000 jobs, according to the report. Employment in the service sector rose by 170,000 jobs in April, down from 172,000 in March. Meanwhile, the manufacturing sector lost 10,000 jobs in April, after losing 3,000 in the prior month. "Fallout from the collapse of oil prices and the surging value of the dollar are weighing on job creation. Employment in the energy sector and manufacturing is declining," said Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Analytics. "However, this should prove temporary and job growth will reaccelerate this summer." The ADP survey studied data from private businesses with more than 23 million workers on payrolls but excluded government job growth. The Labor Department will release its jobs report for April on Friday.

The disappointing ADP survey might suggest hiring could remain sluggish in April's jobs report. The U.S. economy added only 126, 000 jobs in March, marking the first time the monthly job growth below the key 200,000 benchmark over the past year, according to the Labor Department. Endite