WASHINGTON – U.S. employers kept up a brisk hiring pace in June by adding 213,000 jobs in a sign of confidence despite a looming trade war with China.
The Labor Department says the unemployment rate rose to 4.0 percent from 3.8 percent as more people began looking for work.
On the same day that the Trump administration began imposing tariffs on $34 billion in Chinese imports and China retaliated with their own tariffs, the job gain showed that the 9-year old U.S. economic expansion — the second-longest on record — remains on solid ground for the moment.
Average hourly pay rose just 2.7 percent from a year earlier. The low jobless rate has yet to force employers to offer higher wages in order to fill job openings.
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