US adds 227,000 new jobs in January, jobless rate at 4.8%
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US employers stepped up hiring last month, adding a healthy 227,000 jobs, and more Americans began looking for work, a sign that President Donald Trump has inherited a robust job market.
January’s job gain was the best since September, and it exceeded last year’s average monthly gain of 187,000, the Labor Department said yesterday.
The unemployment rate ticked up to a still-low 4.8 percent from 4.7 percent in December. But the rate rose for an encouraging reason: More Americans started looking for work, though not all of them found jobs immediately. The proportion of adults who are either working or looking for work reached its highest point since September.
“The increase in the unemployment rate came about from both more people working and more people looking for work — a positive,” said Gus Faucher, an economist at PNC.
Yet some of the economy’s softness remains: average hourly wages barely rose last month. And the number of people working part time who would prefer full-time work rose.
January’s jobs figures reflect hiring that occurred mainly before Trump was inaugurated on January 20. Still, it was the first employment report to be released with Trump occupying the White House, and he seems sure to take a close interest in it.
As a candidate, Trump frequently argued that the government’s jobs data exaggerated the health of the economy. He called the unemployment rate a “hoax” and said it declined after the recession under President Barack Obama mainly because many Americans stopped working or looking for work.
The biggest factor in that trend has been widespread retirements by the vast generation of baby boomers. But in addition, many Americans of working age have also stopped looking for work.
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