WASHINGTON (AP) — The nation’s employers kept hiring briskly in November despite high inflation and a slow-growing economy — a sign of resilience in the face of the Federal Reserve’s aggressive interest rate hikes.
The economy added 263,000 jobs, while the unemployment rate stayed 3.7%, still near a 53-year low. November’s job growth dipped only slightly from October’s 284,000 gain.
Last month’s hiring amounted to a substantial increase.
All year, as inflation has surged and the Fed has imposed ever-higher borrowing rates, America’s labor market has defied skeptics, adding hundreds of thousands of jobs, month after month.
With not enough people available to fill jobs, businesses are having to offer higher pay to attract and keep workers.
Wall Street not happy with report
Worries about inflation weighed on Wall Street, leaving major indexes mixed after another bumpy day of trading.
The S&P 500 fell 0.1% and the Nasdaq lost 0.2% after being down even more earlier in the day. The Dow ended slightly higher.
A government report showing that wage growth accelerated last month spooked investors since it could mean the Federal Reserve will be less able to ease up on its fight against inflation.
The yield on the two-year Treasury, which tends to track expectations for future Fed action, rose following the release of the report, which also showed that hiring was stronger than anticipated.
