The U.S. labor market showed strength in February, adding 273,000 jobs
Source: Washington Post
The U.S. economy added 273,000 jobs in February, showing impressive growth and strength even amid recent concerns about coronavirus’ economic fallout. The unemployment rate fell slightly to 3.5 percent. The jobless rate remains near a 50-year low. Analysts had predicted an uptick of 140,000 to 170,000 jobs, including in the health care and professional services sectors. Still, those gains were expected to be tempered by continued losses in retail, mining and manufacturing.
February’s strong performance reflected the calm before the coronavirus panic gripped the global economy. Over the past few weeks, experts have gone from sanguine to increasingly alarmed about the virus’ threat to global growth, as the outbreak has spread to nearly 90 countries and sickened almost 100,000. Global markets have shown volatility and fallen sharply investors monitored the coronavirus’ dampening effect on manufacturing, travel and consumer spending. Analysts are predicting global economic growth could slow to the lowest levels since the financial crisis this quarter.
Stalled production at Chinese factories has dealt blows to toymakers and electronics manufacturers alike, many of whom were already dealing with the unpredictability of President Trump’s trade war with China. Earlier this week, the Federal Reserve took the unusual step up cutting the benchmark U.S. interest rate by half a percentage point, to get ahead of economic and financial fallout from the coronavirus. And while the coronavirus reports have roiled the financial markets all week, most economists estimated the outbreak won’t have impacted hiring across the United State in February.
“In the midst of a news cycle where one hour feels like an entire day, release of the February employment report brings an opportunity for something of a virtual nostalgic throwback,” wrote Bankrate’s Mark Hamrick before the report was released. “It cannot yet reflect the full potential economic impacts still to come from the coronavirus outbreak or the recent sharp selloff in the stock market.” Temporary jobs, which could have been one of the first employment areas impacted by the coronavirus, declined by 3,300 in February.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/03/06/march-jobs-report/
Full headline: The U.S. labor market showed strength in February, adding 273,000 jobs, despite concerns of the coronavirus outbreak
= new reply since forum marked as read
(DU is not letting me edit the OP.
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(some on DU might even argue it was the data itself that did it! 
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