Official figures show that the US economy added a stronger than expected 180,000 new jobs in March. This was largely because of a recovery in construction hiring.
The Labor Department also said that job growth was stronger than previously thought in the two previous months.
The March employment report painted a stronger picture of the US job market than anticipated and included a surprising decline in the unemployment rate to 4.4% from 4.5% in February. This was the lowest monthly unemployment rate since last October.
Wall Street analysts had forecast that a more modest 120,000 jobs would be created last month and that the unemployment rate would edge up to 4.6%.
The US government also revised up its estimate for jobs created in January and February - by 16,000 each month - to 162,000 and 113,000 respectively.
It said that there were 56,000 construction jobs added in March, a striking turnaround from February when 61,000 of these jobs were lost, some of them possibly due to cold weather. In addition, there were twice as many new retail jobs added in March - 35,900 versus 17,400 in February.
The relatively strong jobs report may help counter some other recent signs of economic weakness.
