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Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today's Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

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James Van Der Beek, best known to many as Dawson Leery from his breakout role in the late-'90s drama Dawson's Creek, died at the age of 48 on Wednesday. Although to many he will forever be Dawson, an aspiring teen film director, Van Der Beek, who battled colorectal cancer, built an impressive, varied career in…

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It's Groundhog Day for Siri yet again, as Apple plans another in a long series of delays to the Siri AI upgrade, according to a Bloomberg report released on Wednesday. According to Bloomberg sources from inside Apple, the reinvented Siri voice assistant, including AI features reminiscent of Alexa Plus, has been delayed from the March iPhone…

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The same three sectors continue to produce the most jobs

February 11, 2026

• U.S. economy added 130,000 jobs in January, as unemployment held at 4.3%.
  

• Health care, social assistance, and construction led hiring, while federal government and financial jobs declined.
  

• Annual benchmark revisions sharply lowered 2025 job growth totals.
  

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If you are looking for a job, your prospects may be getting a little brighter. U.S. employers added 130,000 jobs in January, significantly more than expected.

The unemployment rate was unchanged at 4.3%, signaling a steady but restrained start to 2026. The latest figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) show modest job growth following a sluggish 2025, when payrolls expanded by an average of just 15,000 jobs per month.

Gains last month were concentrated in health care, social assistance, and construction, while federal government payrolls continued to shrink and financial sector employment declined.

Unemployment steady, but higher than a year ago

The jobless rate held at 4.3% in January, with 7.4 million Americans unemployed. That is little changefrom December, but up from 4.0% and 6.9 million unemployed a year earlier.

Teenagers saw some improvement, with their unemployment rate falling to 13.6%. Rates for adult men (3.8%), adult women (4.0%), and major racial and ethnic groups showed little monthly movement. Black workers continued to face a higher unemployment rate at 7.2%, compared with 3.7% for White workers, 4.1% for Asian workers, and 4.7% for Hispanic workers.

Long-term unemployment defined as those jobless for 27 weeks or more was essentially unchanged at 1.8 million in January. However, thathas risen by 386,000 over the past year. One in four unemployed workers has been out of work for at least six months.

The labor force participation rate remained at 62.5%, and the employment-population ratio held at 59.8%, both largely unchanged over the past year.

There was some relief in involuntary part-time employment. The number of people working part time for economic reasons fell by 453,000 to 4.9 million in January, though that figure remains higher than a year ago. Meanwhile, 5.8 million people outside the labor force said they wanted a job, down by 399,000 from December.

Health care drives job gains

Health care once again led job growth, adding 82,000 positions in January. Ambulatory health care services accounted for 50,000 of those jobs, while hospitals added 18,000 and nursing and residential care facilities contributed 13,000.

Social assistance employment rose by 42,000, primarily in individual and family services. Construction added 33,000 jobs, largely among nonresidential specialty trade contractors. Construction employment had been essentially flat throughout 2025.

Other major industries including manufacturing, retail trade, transportation and warehousing, professional and business services, and leisure and hospitality showed little change over the month.