The above-consensus 288,000 increase in non-farm payrolls in April and the corresponding drop in the unemployment rate to a four-and-a-half-year low of 6.3% underline why the markets and the Fed were unconcerned by the near-stagnation in first-quarter GDP growth. (The consensus forecast was 218,000.) The unusually severe winter weather may have hit activity and employment in January and February, but the economy is making up for that now.
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