First published in Business New Hampshire Magazine, May 4, 2026.
Economic uncertainty appears to have slowed hiring substantially in New Hampshire during 2025, and average private-sector wages fell behind inflation during the year.
Fewer NH Jobs, Slipping Behind National Growth
The latest data available from New Hampshire Employment Security show that employers filled about 2,200 fewer jobs in the state during 2025 than in 2024. That was a 0.3% decline in the number of jobs based in the state.
National data show a similar, but slightly healthier, picture overall. While there were five months of employment declines nationally in 2025, overall employment ended 2025 slightly higher than in 2024. New Hampshire fell behind that benchmark.
More Workers Are Available
In the recent past, and particularly in the years immediately following the COVID-19, a stagnant number of added jobs in New Hampshire could be interpreted as the result of a workforce shortage. Employers faced challenges filling jobs because they could not find employees to work in them.
However, the labor market has changed substantially since February 2022, when there were an estimated 3.5 job openings for every unemployed person seeking work in New Hampshire. Seasonally-adjusted data for 2025 suggested that figure declined to about 1.5 job openings per unemployed person on average during the year, and December 2025 data indicated only about one job opening for every unemployed person.
With more people seeking work and not finding it, the unemployment rate in New Hampshire has increased. It averaged slightly above 3% during 2025, while the 2024 average was about 2.6%. The average number of people unemployed and actively seeking work each month rose by about 3,600 from 2024 to 2025, and the size of the overall labor force in the state also expanded as well, according to preliminary data. The labor force constraint, while it will likely return because of the state’s long-term demographics, appears to have eased.
While continuing claims for unemployment compensation have increased in 2025, they remain similar to levels in 2018, and average initial unemployment claims rose a relatively small amount in 2025. Neither dataset suggest significant layoffs across multiple industries.
These data, paired with similar trends on the national level, suggest widespread economic uncertainty was the primary cause of dampened job growth in New Hampshire, rather than a limited supply of workers.
Employment Changes Vary by Industry
While employers in most sectors reported an overall decline in the number of employees, some sectors continued to expand. Health care and social assistance, the state’s largest employment sector, grew by 2,200 employees (2.2%) from 2024 to 2025. Arts, entertainment, and recreation employment grew a healthy 5.9%, adding about 900 workers.
Manufacturing employment declined by 1,200 workers (1.7%) and both wholesale trade and retail trade lost at least 1,000 employees each. Federal and state government employment declined while local governments added a small number of jobs. Most other employment sectors held relatively steady.
Wages Slip Behind Inflation
Even before the recent increases in fossil fuel prices and other inflationary pressures, Granite Staters were facing rising costs for essentials. For the year ending in February, before the conflict with Iran escalated, the costs of food, housing, and household energy costs were already outpacing overall inflation in the northeastern United States.
But wages in New Hampshire did not keep up with the overall measure of inflation, either. In New England, annual consumer inflation was 3.2% between 2024 and 2025. Average private sector hourly wages, however, increased slightly less than one percent, and fell 2.2% after adjusting for inflation. That indicates an employee, earning the average private sector wage in New Hampshire, saw about one out of every $46 earned disappear to inflation faster than their income grew.
Most sectors saw their average wages fall behind inflation in 2025, with wages in professional, business, private education, and health services slipping the most. Wages in trade, transportation, and utilities outpaced inflation, but the job losses in wholesale and retail trade, within this sector, could have been the result of low-wage job losses and influenced the average.
Certainty and Uncertainty
Both employers and workers appear to be facing economic headwinds from policy uncertainty. While the economy faced challenges in 2024, it entered 2025 with key strengths, including a growing labor force in New Hampshire. However, significant fiscal policy, geopolitical, and trade policy changes appear to have stalled hiring in 2025, and may be continuing to do so in 2026.
Investment decisions, for both businesses and households, are made more difficult when economic conditions are difficult to forecast. Nearly one in four Granite State households did not have at least $2,000 in emergency, nonretirement savings in 2022, and national data suggests households are less prepared to weather an economic downturn now than they were four years ago. After a tepid 2025, economic headwinds have become a bigger threat to the financial well-being of families and businesses.