WASHINGTON, June 1: US employers added 157,000 jobs in May, the Labour Department said on Friday in a sign that the world’s biggest economy is regaining vitality after the weakest growth in over four years.

The unemployment rate held steady at 4.5 per cent, the agency said.

The report on non-farm payrolls, seen as one of the best indicators of economic momentum, was well ahead of the Wall Street consensus forecast of 135,000 new jobs.

The agency made some minor downward revisions to estimates for prior months. The number of jobs added in April was revised to 80,000 instead of 88,000 and in March to 175,000 from 177,000.

The service sector led gains in May with 176,000 new jobs, while the manufacturing sector had a net loss of 19,000 positions.

The data suggested that the economy is starting to rebound from its slowest pace of growth in over four years.

The government said on Thursday that first-quarter growth slowed to a tepid 0.6 per cent pace, but many analysts say that was the low point of the year. The Federal Reserve, which has held rates steady for nearly a year, has said inflation remains a bigger concern than an economic downturn.

Avery Shenfeld, economist at CIBC World Markets, said the payrolls report appears to confirm the Fed’s view that the economy is gathering pace after a first-quarter soft patch.

“The trend year-to-date in job growth is 133,000 on average, and that’s a pace that should neither threaten recession nor create too much inflation,” Shenfeld said.

“If the Fed were trying to steer the economy this is roughly the picture they would like to see.”

Gary Thayer, chief economist at AG Edwards, agreed that the economy is picking up steam but sees only a 2.4 per cent growth pace in the April-June quarter.

The latest report “shows the economy is pretty healthy -- we have good jobs growth, steady unemployment at a low level and suggests that growth will be stronger in the second quarter.” —AFP