Photo taken on Sept. 3, 2021 shows a hiring notice in front of a restaurant in Washington, D.C., the United States. (Xinhua/Liu Jie)
LONDON, Jan. 15 (Xinhua) -- Although the pace of job growth in the United States slowed in December 2021, the labor market appears tight, a Financial Times editorial has said.
U.S. employers added 199,000 jobs last month, with the growth far below the expectations of economists surveyed by the Wall Street Journal, which estimated a gain of 422,000 jobs. It also represented the smallest monthly gain in a year.
While employment growth was down, the British newspaper said Wednesday that it "appears to be because businesses struggled to find workers: the unemployment rate fell to 3.9 percent, slightly above the rate in February 2020."
"This departure of workers from the jobs market means that while inflation and wage data indicate that the United States might be very close to what economists refer to as full employment, there are still 3.6 million fewer workers in the U.S. than before the pandemic," the newspaper added. ■
