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April 3, 2015

U.S. jobs report for March misses mark

The March jobs report from the federal government brought a year-long streak of monthly payroll gains topping 200,000 to an end with only 126,000 jobs added in the month.

The gains, revealed Friday in the monthly report from the Labor Department, were well below market expectations of 245,000 based a Bloomberg poll and off from the 264,000 increase in February. Any effect of the jobs report on the stock market won’t be seen until Monday since there is no trading on Good Friday.

The nation’s unemployment rate held steady at 5.5 percent, as analysts expected. Hourly earnings were slightly above expectations of a 0.2-percent increase, growing by 0.3 percent and increasing 2.1 percent compared to the previous year.

Meanwhile, job growth from February was revised down to 264,000 from 295,000. Over the last three months, job gains have averaged 197,000 a month.

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