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The US economy added 227,000 jobs in November, seasonally adjusted, the Labor Department announced on Friday.
That’s a steep climb from last month’s revised total of 36,000. A major Boeing strike and two hurricanes in the South contributed to October’s low numbers, CNN reported.
The weather also seemed better in November. In October, inclement weather caused more than half a million workers to miss work, while in November, only 62,000 workers said the same, according to the New York Times.
The unemployment rate in November inched up 0.1% from October to 4.2%. That marked the first time since 2021 that the unemployment rate hovered at or above 4% for six months in a row, per CNN.
Wages, meanwhile, looked solid. Average hourly wages climbed 0.4% in November. In the last year, the Labor Department noted average hourly earnings have jumped 4%.
What does it mean? Getting a read on the report depends on what you want to focus on.
“The economy continues to produce a healthy amount of job and income gains, but a further increase in the unemployment rate tempers some of the shine in the labor market and gives the Fed what it needs to cut rates in December,” Ellen Zentner, chief economic strategist at Morgan Stanley Wealth Management, told CNBC.
Others see warning flares. “The labor market is healthy even though it is, in the long term, trending in an unhealthy direction,” Noah Yosif, chief economist for the American Staffing Association, told CNN. “What we’re seeing is really a K-shaped duality of outcomes for the labor market: It’s good if you have a job, but it’s very, very difficult if you don’t have a job.”
That’s no shock, necessarily. Regardless, we might not be as in the clear as one would hope.
“It’s decent, but it’s nothing to get too excited about,” Sarah House, a senior economist at Wells Fargo, told the New York Times, in reference to job growth. “We’re not seeing it fall apart by any means, but I don’t think we’ve seen the end of the soft patch just yet.”