By PAUL WISEMAN | AP Economics Writer
WASHINGTON — The nation’s employers added a robust 216,000 jobs last month, the latest sign that the American job market remains resilient even in the face of sharply higher interest rates.
Friday’s report from the Labor Department showed that December’s job gain exceeded the 173,000 that were added in November. The unemployment rate was unchanged at 3.7% — the 23rd straight month that joblessness has remained below 4%.
The latest data reflect an economy and a job market that are decelerating back to pre-pandemic norms. Hiring remains steady, and while employers are posting fewer openings, they are not laying off many workers.
Despite the low unemployment and cooling inflation, polls show that many Americans are dissatisfied with the economy. That disconnect, which will likely be an issue in the 2024 elections, has puzzled economists and political analysts.
A key factor, though, is the public’s exasperation with higher prices. Though inflation has been falling more or less steadily for a year and a half, prices are still 17% higher than they were before the inflation surge began.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell warned of hard times ahead after the central bank began jacking up interest rates in the spring of 2022 to attack high inflation. Most economists predicted that the much higher borrowing costs that resulted would cause a recession, with layoffs and rising unemployment, in 2023.
Yet the recession never arrived, and none appears to be on the horizon. The nation’s labor market, though cooler than in the sizzling-hot years of 2022 and 2023, is still cranking out enough jobs to keep the unemployment rate near historic lows.
The resilience of the job market has been matched by the durability of the overall economy. Far from collapsing into a recession, the U.S. gross domestic product — the total output of goods and services — grew at a vigorous 4.9% annual pace from July through September. Strong consumer…
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