The economy added just 210,000 jobs in the month of November, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Friday, and the unemployment rate fell to 4.2 percent from 4.6 percent.
Economists had been expecting a gain of 535,000 jobs and the unemployment rate to fall to 4.5 percent.
“At this point in the year, we’re looking at the sharpest one-year decline in unemployment ever,” President Joe Biden said during remarks delivered at the White House Friday morning. “America is back to work. And our jobs recovery is going very strong.”
Citing upward revisions in previous months of jobs data, Biden said that “all told, in the first 10 full months of my administration, the economy has created 6 million jobs, a record for a new president.”
Friday’s release comes after payroll company ADP reported a gain of 534,000 private sector jobs in November, down from 571,000 in the previous month.
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