U.S. unemployment rate unchanged at 5.1 pct. in September

The jobless rate, which is derived from a separate survey of households, was unchanged only because 350,000 workers stopped looking for work last month and were no longer counted as part of the labour force.

Average hourly wages fell by a cent to $25.09 during the month and were up only 2.2 percent from the same month in 2014, holding around the same levels seen all year and pointing to marginal inflationary pressures.

Wages dipped last month after accelerating in August. A sharp fall in exports has likely slowed growth in the July-September quarter to an annual rate of just 1.5 percent, according to economists from JPMorgan Chase. “They are struggling to get by, let alone get ahead“.

It’s unclear which way the September data will influence central bank policy makers.

Now that modest momentum seems to have stalled altogether. It was another Summer Bummer for the labor market.

The number of jobs created in July and August were revised down by a combined 59,000. In September, job gains occurred in health care and information, while employment in mining continued to decline.

Wage growth was also disappointing.

‘The chances of a rate hike by the Fed this year just went way down. “In this environment, and with ongoing concerns around China’s slowdown, it is hard to see any reason why the Fed would consider hiking rates in Q4″. This is due to low oil prices stopping exploration for oil and gas. The data “took a [Federal] rate hike off the table for this year and heightens fear of a global slowdown”, said Chris Jarvis, energy analyst at Caprock Risk Management.

There may be a few payback after the surge in local government education payrolls in recent months, Ted Wieseman, an economist at Morgan Stanley, said in a note before the report. The underlying economy is incredibly weak, even though interest rates have effectively been zero for the last 6 years.

So just 12 more months?

That hasn’t been the case, however.

USA consumers are spending at a healthy pace, boosting job gains in sectors like retail and hotels and restaurants.

But economists estimate that the economy now only needs to add about 100,000 jobs a month to keep up with population growth. They were up 2.2% from a year earlier, consistent with the sluggish trend throughout the expansion.

Retailers increased payrolls by 23,700.

Of the 142,000 positions added in September, men and women gained 82,000 and 60,000 jobs, respectively.

Scott Paul, president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, noted that USA manufacturing lost 9,000 jobs in September and 19,000 in August.