December 2019 Jobs Report

WASHINGTON — The U.S. jobs market ended 2019 on a sour note, with December’s payroll and wage growth missing expectations, according to Labor Department figures released Friday.

Nonfarm payrolls increased by just 145,000 while the unemployment rate held steady at 3.5%. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been looking for job growth of 160,000. The jobless rate met expectations for staying at a 50-year low.

The latest jobs report included downward revisions to both October and November’s payroll gains. New jobs in October totaled 152,000, down 4,000 from the previous estimate. And payrolls in November were revised down by 10,000 to 256,000.

Ahead of the report, most economists expected that payrolls gains would decrease in December after surging in November, when General Motors (GM) employees striking between September and October returned to work and pushed up results. But the end of the strike only accounted for a net revised 39,300 of November’s payroll gains in...