05/06/2022

U.S. Unemployment Rate Remains at Pandemic Low

Employers added 428,000 jobs last month

U.S. employers added 428,000 jobs in April, capping a year of solid growth, adding more fuel to an already robust recovery. The unemployment rate remained steady at a pandemic low of 3.6 percent, the Labor Department said Friday.

The labor market has added more than 6.5 million jobs in the past year and is on pace to return to pre-pandemic levels this summer, although economists say there are signs that this record streak of employment gains is beginning to moderate. The number of people working or searching for work, for example, declined by 363,000 in April after six months of gains. And the pace of average wage growth slowed slightly to 0.3 percent, from 0.4 percent a month earlier.

"This has been an extraordinary jobs recovery, but this kind of growth can’t last forever, especially now that the unemployment level is as low as it is,” said Scott Anderson, the chief economist for Bank of the West in San Francisco. “It’s getting harder to find folks to come back into the labor market, even if you’re paying higher wages.”

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