GotCredit / CC BY 2.0

Employers added a mere 142,000 jobs in September, the Labor Department announced Friday, suggesting that the U.S. economy is losing momentum after a second month of lackluster growth.

The news comes two weeks after the Federal Reserve decided the recovery was still too frail to risk lifting interest rates from their near-zero level.

The New York Times reports:

The official unemployment rate held steady at 5.1 percent, but hourly wages for private sector workers actually fell slightly after jumping by a relatively robust 0.4 percent in August.

The employment report for August was revised sharply downward, showing the economy created only 136,000 jobs, well below the 173,000 originally estimated. …

“There’s nothing good in this morning’s report,” said Carl Tannenbaum, chief economist at Northern Trust in Chicago. “We had very low levels of job creation, wage growth isn’t budging, and the unemployment rate would have risen if the labor force participation rate hadn’t fallen.”

Andrew Chamberlain, chief economist at Glassdoor Economic Research, agreed. “Unfortunately today’s report will not give much reassurance to Fed policy makers,” he said.

Read more here.

— Posted by Alexander Reed Kelly.

Wait, before you go…

If you're reading this, you probably already know that non-profit, independent journalism is under threat worldwide. Independent news sites are overshadowed by larger heavily funded mainstream media that inundate us with hype and noise that barely scratch the surface. We believe that our readers deserve to know the full story. Truthdig writers bravely dig beneath the headlines to give you thought-provoking, investigative reporting and analysis that tells you what’s really happening and who’s rolling up their sleeves to do something about it.

Like you, we believe a well-informed public that doesn’t have blind faith in the status quo can help change the world. Your contribution of as little as $5 monthly or $35 annually will make you a groundbreaking member and lays the foundation of our work.

Support Truthdig