The US economy added 292,000 jobs in December, and the unemployment rate remained unchanged at 0.5%, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported on Friday.
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US economy adds 292,000 jobs in December
The health sector recorded 39,000 jobs, making it the highest, followed by food services and drinking places (37,000) and transportation and warehousing (23,000).
Employment gains occurred in several industries, led by professional and business services, construction, health care, and food services and drinking places. Mining employment continued to decline, the data shows.
The mining sector lost 8,000 jobs, according to the data.
The robust figures suggest resilience in the US economy at a time of market turmoil in China, the world's second biggest economy, and global economic uncertainty, according to the BBC.
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"It is one more sign the domestic economy continues to chug along," said Kate Warne, an investment strategist at Edward Jones.
"It is not a game changer in terms of faster economic growth, but it offsets some of the other indicators that recently have suggested the economy might be slowing down."
Employment in other major industries, including wholesale trade, retail trade, financial activities, and government, changed little over the month, according to BLS.
Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rate for blacks declined to 8.3 percent in December, while the rates for adult men (4.7 percent), adult women (4.4 percent), teenagers (16.1 percent), whites (4.5 percent), Asians (4.0 percent), and Hispanics (6.3 percent) showed little or no change.
The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was essentially unchanged at 2.1 million in December and accounted for 26.3 percent of the unemployed.
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The number of long-term unemployed has shown little movement since June, but was down by 687,000 over the year.
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