At the same time, while some of the highest-paid employees on Wall Street and at many leading companies have enjoyed big jumps in compensation, most workers have experienced only very modest wage gains, heightening worries about income inequality.

The American economy still faces fundamental headwinds that are not likely to abate soon — like a persistent trade gap, low productivity and the long-term erosion of factory jobs that provide an economic lifeline to workers without a college degree.

In fact, the manufacturing sector was one of the few weak spots in the economy last month, losing 29,000 jobs.

But companies in the business of providing health care, leisure and hospitality and retailing each gained more than 40,000 jobs in March. And two very different sectors that pay well — construction as well as professional and business services — both added more than 30,000 jobs.

The overall unemployment rate rose to 5 percent last month, compared with 4.9 percent in February. But even that was a positive indication, analysts said, since it was the uptick in new entrants to the labor force that mostly accounted for the rise rather than job losses.

If anything, Friday’s report portrays an economy gradually returning to a more normal trajectory, while so far avoiding the bubblelike excesses that prevailed in the late 1990s and just before the Great Recession in December 2007.