The long, slow recovery in the U.S. job market is leaving ever-more Americans on the sidelines””and complicating the calculus for Federal Reserve policy makers weighing when the economy can get by with less help.
Employers added 169,000 jobs in August, the Labor Department said Friday, a bit more than in July, and the unemployment rate fell to 7.3%, the best mark of the recovery.
But beneath such positive numbers lay evidence of a job market stuck in second gear. The government revised down its estimate for June and July hiring by a combined 74,000 jobs, and a disproportionate share of the jobs that are being added are in low-paying sectors such as restaurants and retail.