U.S. job growth increased briskly in December, further strengthening the economy's fundamentals and opening the door wider to an interest rate increase from the Federal Reserve this year despite a gloomy world economy.
Non-farm payrolls increased 252,000 last month after a revised 353,000 jump in November, the U.S. Labor Department said on Friday. The unemployment rate fell 0.2 percentage points to a six-and-a-half-year low of 5.6%. However, some of the decline reflected people leaving the labour force.
December marked the 11th straight month of payroll increases above 200,000, the longest stretch since 1994. With October's count also revised higher, the economy created 50,000 more jobs than previously reported in the prior two months.
Economists had expected employment to increase 240,000 in December and the unemployment rate to fall one-10th of a percentage point to 5.7%
