A burst of hiring in December pushed the unemployment rate to its lowest level in nearly three years, giving the economy a boost at the end of 2011.
The Labor Department says employers added a net 200,000 jobs last month and the unemployment rate fell to 8.5 percent, the lowest since February 2009. The rate has dropped for four straight months.
The hiring gains cap a six-month stretch in which the economy generated 100,000 jobs or more in each month. That hasn't happened since April 2006.
For all of 2011, the economy added 1.6 million jobs, better than the 940,000 added in 2010. The unemployment rate averaged 8.9 percent last year, down from 9.6 percent the previous year.
Economists forecast that the job gains will top 2.1 million this year.
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
With early voting ending Thursday, Davidson County voters are considering the pros and cons of a proposed transit plan on the ballot and how much it will cost in a car-centric town.
More >>With early voting ending Thursday, Davidson County voters are considering the pros and cons of a proposed transit plan on the ballot and how much it will cost in a car-centric town.
More >>A News4 I-Team investigation found parents so frantic that their children were hours late on Metro school buses that police were called to find them.
More >>A News4 I-Team investigation found parents so frantic that their children were hours late on Metro school buses that police were called to find them.
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More >>As many grieve the lives lost during the Antioch Waffle House shooting, there's something to note. In Tennessee, we do not forget our heroes. Another community lost one of their own to a mass shooting six months ago.
More >>Playing the Winnipeg Jets is exactly why Nashville coach Peter Laviolette wanted home-ice advantage in the NHL playoffs.
More >>Playing the Winnipeg Jets is exactly why Nashville coach Peter Laviolette wanted home-ice advantage in the NHL playoffs.
More >>A state representative accused of sexual misconduct will return to his district without having faced any action from his fellow legislators. A News 4 I-Team investigation last month detailed allegations from three women who said Rep. David Byrd, R-Waynesboro, initiated sexual contact with them while they were teens on his basketball team decades ago.
More >>A state representative accused of sexual misconduct will return to his district without having faced any action from his fellow legislators. A News 4 I-Team investigation last month detailed allegations from three women who said Rep. David Byrd, R-Waynesboro, initiated sexual contact with them while they were teens on his basketball team decades ago.
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More >>Rutherford County has revealed its new $73 million judicial center.
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More >>The scandal involving former Nashville Mayor Megan Barry has some Metro Councilmembers calling for rule changes.
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More >>A police report says that a man suspected of killing four people at a Waffle House in Nashville had come to the attention of police in eastern Tennessee in February after a woman said he charged at her in her motel room.
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More >>Nashville Mayor David Briley has proclaimed Friday, April 27, as Preds Pride Day.
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More >>Police are looking for three suspects accused of stealing a family's valuables in moving boxes off the porch of a home in Clarksville.
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More >>Police are looking for two women they say shot a man in broad daylight near two popular restaurants in East Nashville.
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More >>A well-known retired football coach played a key part in the liberation of Dachau, the first of many concentration camps established by Germany's Nazi regime.
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More >>A 12-year-old female kangaroo died at a Chinese zoo after visitors hurled rocks and other objects at it.
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More >>HD Supply is recalling 144,000 of their Seasons Ceiling Fans after discovering the brackets connected to the blades can break, causing the blades to fall.
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More >>An artist says he owed it to a hero to create a tribute. That artist was moved by the actions of James Shaw Jr. during the Antioch Waffle House shooting.
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More >>The brother of shooting victim DeEbony Groves said Belmont University will award her a posthumous degree at graduation May 5.
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More >>An employee at a White Castle in Louisville, Kentucky has been diagnosed with acute hepatitis A and may have infected customers, health sources claim.
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More >>An explosion rocked a refinery in northwestern Wisconsin on Thursday, injuring at least 11 people, forcing the evacuation of homes, schools and a hospital, and sending a plume of noxious smoke into the air.
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More >>A police report says that a man suspected of killing four people at a Waffle House in Nashville had come to the attention of police in eastern Tennessee in February after a woman said he charged at her in her motel room.
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More >>Finding the right childcare can be a frustrating -- and expensive -- process for parents around the world, from New York to Nairobi.
More >>