But fewer workers were in the labor force as the growing population adds more than 200,000 eligible for employment.
The U.S. economy added 169,000 jobs in August and the unemployment rate went down to 7.3 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics announced this morning.
The unemployment rate was 7.4 percent in July and 8.1 percent a year ago, the bureau said. August's rate is the lowest in nearly five years.
Other figures included in the report show the jobs figures come with some major caveats:
The unemployment rate for various ethnic groups is little changed from a month ago, with 13 percent of black and 9.3 percent of Hispanic workers still without jobs, nearly six years after the 2007 recession began.
The number of long-term unemployed -- those jobless for 27 weeks or more -- was basically unchanged at 4.3 million. They amount to 37.9 percent of all the unemployed.
But the labor force participation rate remained near record lows as it ticked down from 63.4 percent to 63.2 percent, the lowest level since August 1978, the Associated Press reports. This has been a stubborn figure as millions of jobs have been created in the last four years but the rate has seldom kept up population growth, which was 203,000 in August. There were 115,000 fewer people employed in August than there were in July, despite the increase in the number of jobs. The labor force declined by 312,000. The number of unemployed was down by 198,000. The number of people not in the labor force increased by 516,000.
“Pretty disappointing,” Beth Ann Bovino, U.S. chief economist at Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services, told the AP. “You saw more people leave the job market and fewer people get jobs. Not a good sign.”
One possible positive point was the number of people working part time for economic reasons declined by 334,000 to 7.9 million, while those marginally attached to the labor force -- they are able to work and had looked for a job sometime in the last 12 months -- were down 219,000 from a year before. Among that group, discouraged workers -- those not looking for work because they believe there are no jobs available for them -- remained basically unchanged at 866,000.
The economy has added an average of 184,000 jobs per month for the last 12 months, or 2.2 million in that year.
Retail led the way in August adding 44,000 jobs. Health care added 33,000 jobs in the month. Manufacturing grew by 19,000 jobs in August after shedding 10,000 jobs in July. The adding manufacturing jobs were attributed to rehiring auto workers laid off in July during model changeovers. Construction was basically unchanged from the previous month.
Average payrolls increased by 0.1 hour in August and hourly wages rose 5 cents to $24.05.
New jobs figures for June were revised down from 188,000 to 172,000 and figures for July were revised own from 162,000 to 104,000.