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Fewer jobs were created than expected in the United States in May.
Employment outside agriculture in the United States, the so-called nonfarm payrolls, increased by 559,000 people in May, figures from the US Department of Labor’s statistics wing show on Friday.
An increase of 671,000 people was expected in advance, according to estimates obtained by the Dow Jones.
Employment increased in the service sector, the health sector and in both the public and private education sectors, the press release states. The number of employees in the United States is 7.6 million lower than before the pandemic.
In April, job growth was very disappointing, when 266,000 jobs were created against the expected one million. The April figures were revised up to 278,000 new jobs on Friday.
The US employment figures are often referred to as “the most important figures of the month”, because the figures give an indication of how things are in the world’s most important economy. The figures are closely followed by the US Federal Reserve, and they are also closely followed in financial markets around the world.
The unemployment rate fell from 6.1 per cent to 5.8 per cent in May. An unemployment rate of 5.9 per cent was expected in advance.
Wage growth was 2.0 per cent on an annual basis in May, while on a monthly basis it was 0.5 per cent. In advance, analysts expected wage growth to be 0.2 percent on a monthly basis in May, according to Bloomberg.
The leading US stock market indices are rising in pre-trading after the employment figures were published. Slower employment growth contributes to raising confidence that the US Federal Reserve will avoid tightening monetary policy, writes CNBC.
– The labor market improved sharply in May, but the outcome is still below expectations. The improvement is probably due to further reopening of the economy. The development is still probably too weak for the Fed to consider signaling austerity measures at the forthcoming monetary policy meeting, writes senior economist Knut A. Magnussen in DNB Markets in an update. (Terms)Copyright Dagens Næringsliv AS and / or our suppliers. We want you to share our cases using a link, which leads directly to our pages. Copying or other use of all or part of the content may only take place with written permission or as permitted by law. For additional terms look here.
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