Jobless Rate Drop Improves Outlook; Labor Numbers Assuage Investors
U.S. unemployment dropped slightly last month and hourly wages rose, evidence of a still-healthy labor market that eased many investors' concerns about a possible economic slowdown.</br></br>New data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed the unemployment rate fell to 4.5 percent, from 4.6 percent the month before, as businesses and government created 97,000 new jobs. Hiring in the health and hospitality industries and a spike in government employment made up for a drop in construction jobs and a continued decline in manufacturing employment.</br></br>Average hourly wages paid to non-supervisory and production workers rose 6 cents, to $17.16, a 4 percent increase from a year earlier.</br></br>Though the pace of job creation was slow compared with recent months, the overall report was stronger than expected on Wall Street, giving a small boost to markets that had begun to take a dimmer view of the U.S. economy. Recent reports on economic growth and orders for capital equipment, among other things, pointed to a possible slowdown and contributed to recent volatility in the stock market.</br></br>Bolstering the outlook further: The monthly U.S. trade deficit fell nearly 3.8 percent in January, to $59.12 billion. Buoyed by overseas sales of airplanes and computers, exports increased $1.4 billion, to $126.7 billion; imports fell by about $1 billion, to $185.8 billion.