The U.S. economy added 943,000 jobs last month, the fastest recovery in a year despite the surging delta variant of COVID-19, the Labor Department announced Friday.
The job gain marked its highest since August 2020, when one million positions were added in a single month.
The July report also exceeds the projection of 850,000 jobs added by economists.
The data also showed that the unemployment rate fell to 5.4 percent in July, compared to 5.9 percent in the previous month.
This positive report is good news for President Joe Biden and his administration, who has been criticized by Republicans over the rising inflation and hiring struggles for small businesses.
“Today’s jobs report is decisive proof that Democrats’ Build Back Better economy is working. Under President Biden and the Democratic Majorities in Congress, millions of good-paying jobs have been created, paychecks are surging, the economy is growing at the fastest rate in nearly forty years and the share of Americans living in poverty is set to reach the lowest level on record,” said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) in a statement.
Following the report, Biden strongly asserted that the jobs report proves his efforts to stabilize the economy are working.
“The bottom line is this: What we’re doing is working,” Biden said. “We’ve got a lot of hard work left to be done.”
The president has also released the graph that compares his job growth to Trump’s in their first six months.
“More jobs created than any other president’s first six months in history,” Biden tweeted. “America is on the move again.”
