U.S. employers added far fewer jobs than expected in November, as millions of unemployed Americans likely remained home. But the unemployment rate dropped sharply. Fred Katayama reports.

The pace of hiring slowed abruptly in the U.S. last month. New figures from the Labor Department out Friday show the economy added 210,000 new jobs in November – significantly below economists’ forecasts for as many as half a million, in line with the hiring surge in October.

But at the same time, the unemployment rate plunged, down to 4.2 percent – the lowest level since February 2020, just before the coronavirus pandemic.

And average wages rose.

The report paints a picture of a workforce that still hasn’t fully recovered after a year of health-related restrictions. Millions who lost their jobs have not returned to work. And the spread of the new Omicron variant of the coronavirus poses a continued risk to the economic rebound.

Investors, however, initially liked the report, sending stocks higher at the market open. The less-than-stellar hiring number eased investors concerns about the Federal Reserve’s quicker tightening of monetary policy.

Analysts say the report probably won’t change the Fed’s timeline for paring back its massive bond purchases. But it could give the central bank more room to say it doesn’t have to accelerate the pace of reducing those purchases, especially amid the uncertainty posed by the Omicron variant.

Earlier this week, Fed Chair Jerome Powell said the central bank would consider a faster wind-down to its bond-buying program, which Wall Street saw as opening the door to earlier hikes in interest rates.