Jobs blues as US ends year on subdued note

US jobs growth eased last month with employers adding 148,000 jobs in December, well down on November’s gains, while annual wage growth crept higher.

Closely watched figures from the US labour department, released yesterday, showed that the unemployment rate held steady at 4.1 per cent – the lowest level since 2000.

For the whole of 2017, employers added nearly 2.1 million jobs, enough to lower the unemployment rate from 4.7 per cent a year ago.

Annual wages growth crept up from 2.4 per cent in November to 2.5 per cent last month, the data revealed.

Oliver Kolodseike, senior economist at the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR), said: “With regards to implications for the wider economy, we believe that the US labour market is in a healthy state and that it will support growth over the next few years, although nonfarm payroll growth is likely to slow in 2018.”