Last month's economic growth brought in a whopping 254,000 jobs. That beat previous expectations for a modest rise and dampened Wall Street's hopes for another big rate cut by the Federal Reserve next month.
The Labor Department also reported that the unemployment rate fell to 4.1%, down from 4.2% the previous month.
According to consensus estimates, 150,000 jobs were created last month, up from the 142,000 jobs reported in August.
After the unemployment rate unexpectedly rose to 4.3% in July, the unemployment rate fell slightly to 4.2% in August.
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell signaled Monday that further interest rate cuts are on the way, but would be done at a measured pace aimed at supporting a still healthy economy.
Fed officials cut interest rates to 4.8% from a 20-year high of 5.3% at their last meeting on September 18, and decided to cut rates by two more quarter-points in November and December. did.
Chairman Powell said Monday that that remains the most likely outcome.
“If the economy performs as expected, we will see two more rate cuts this year,'' Powell said, adding that each rate cut would be a quarter of a percentage point.
Data provided by ADP earlier this week showed that private companies added 143,000 jobs in September. That's more than the 125,000 jobs expected by analysts and far more than the 99,000 jobs added in August.
The increase in jobs added in the private sector halted a five-month streak of declines.
However, there were also data showing a weakening job market. The Labor Department said earlier this week that the job turnover rate, a key indicator of workers' confidence in the economy, fell to 1.9% in August from 2% in July.
The 1.9% rate is the lowest pace since June 2020.
Another indicator, the Job Opportunity and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS), showed that the hiring rate reached 3.3% in August, down from 3.4% in July.
Excluding the pandemic, the 3.3% rate was the lowest since August 2013. Finance according to Yahoo!
The number of posted jobs also peaked at 12.2 million in March 2022, and has steadily declined to 8 million in August.
The labor market is still creating jobs reliably every month, enough to give Americans the confidence and paychecks to keep spending and keep the economy afloat.
But the pace of hiring has slowed in the past few months, a sign that employers are becoming more cautious.
Employers added an average of just 116,000 jobs a month from June to August, including a dismal 89,000 in July.
This marked the weakest three-month period of employment since mid-2020.
Employment numbers have fallen significantly from a record monthly average of 604,000 in 2021, at the end of the coronavirus recession, to 377,000 in 2022.
Despite the cooling in the labor market, the economy remained resilient overall, growing at a strong annual rate of 3% between April and June, thanks to consumer spending and business investment.
Annual growth for the just-ended July-September period has slowed but remains a healthy 2.5%, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta's forecasting tool.
Resilience has been eased.
Economists had expected the Federal Reserve's aggressive campaign to curb inflation, which raised interest rates 11 times in 2022 and 2023, to trigger a recession.
It wasn't. The economy continued to grow even as borrowing costs for consumers and businesses rose to an all-time high.
The Federal Reserve began lowering interest rates last month to shore up a slowing job market.
As the Nov. 5 presidential election approaches, the economy is weighing heavily on voters.
Many Americans are unimpressed with the sustainability of the job market and remain dissatisfied with inflation, which remains an average of 19% higher than it was in February 2021.
That's when the economy recovered from the pandemic recession with unexpected speed and force, creating severe material and labor shortages and causing inflation to soar.
For the economy as a whole, most indicators look solid.
with post wire
