NEWS
September's jobs creation comes up short with gain of just 194,000
  • Nonfarm payrolls increased by 194,000 in September, compared with the Dow Jones estimate for 500,000.
  • The unemployment rate dropped to 4.8%, better than the expected 5.1%.
  • Leisure and hospitality along with professional and business services and retail led job creation.
  • Markets initially reacted little to what was a mixed bag of a report held back by a sharp decline in government jobs.

The U.S. economy created jobs at a much slower-than-expected pace in September, a pessimistic sign about the state of the economy though the total was held back substantially by a sharp drop in government employment.

Nonfarm payrolls rose by just 194,000 in the month, compared with the Dow Jones estimate of 500,000, the Labor Department reported Friday. The unemployment rate fell to 4.8%, better than the expectation for 5.1% and the lowest since February 2020.

Despite the weak jobs total, wages increased sharply. The monthly gain of 0.6% pushed the year-over-year rise to 4.6% as companies use wage increases to combat the persistent labor shortage. The available workforce declined by 183,000 in September and is 3.1 million shy of where it was in February 2020, just before the pandemic was declared.

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