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Private sector payrolls grew at the weakest pace in more than 3½ years in August, providing yet another sign of a deteriorating labor market, according to ADP.

Companies hired just 99,000 workers for the month, less than the downwardly revised 111,000 in July and below the Dow Jones consensus forecast for 140,000.

August was the weakest month for job growth since January 2021, according to data from the payrolls processing firm.

"The job market's downward drift brought us to slower-than-normal hiring after two years of outsized growth," ADP's chief economist, Nela Richardson, said.

The report corroborates multiple data points recently that show hiring has slowed considerably from its blistering pace following the Covid outbreak in early 2020.

Job openings in July also touched their lowest point since January 2021, according to a Labor Department report Wednesday, while outplacement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas reported Thursday that this was the worst August for layoffs since 2009 and the slowest year for hiring since the firm started tracking the metric in 2005.

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