US employers add 157,000 jobs, unemployment rate hits 3.9%

U.S. employers slowed their hiring in July, adding 157,000 jobs, a solid gain but below the healthy pace in the first half of this year. Also, the unemployment rate ticked down to 3.9% from 4%, the Labor Department said Friday. That’s near the 18-year low of 3.8% reached in May.

Employers added an average of 224,000 new workers per month in the first half of the year, a faster pace than in 2017.
The pickup impressed many economists because it’s coming late in the economic expansion, which has entered its 10th year and is now the second-longest in U.S. history. The slip in hiring last month may be temporary, economists predict.

The economy expanded at a 4.1% annual rate in the April-June quarter, the strongest showing in nearly four years.

Average hourly pay gains remained modest, increasing 2.7% from a year earlier, the same as the previous two months. Typically, when unemployment has fallen below 4% in the past, wages have increased at a faster pace.

The number of part-time workers who would prefer full-time work has fallen nearly 13% in the past year and now stands at 4.6 million. That’s the fewest in 11 years.

And the underemployment rate—which includes discouraged workers no longer searching for work, as well as involuntary part-time workers—dropped to 7.5%, the lowest in 17 years, from 7.8%.

Lower-skilled workers are also benefiting from companies’ demand for labor. The unemployment rate for those without a high-school diploma fell to 5.1%, the lowest on record.

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