Getting a clear view of the US job market hasn’t been easy the past few months. Hurricanes and a big strike at Boeing threw off the October job numbers, pushing them down and setting up a payback rebound in November. But US hiring picked up unexpectedly in December as employers added 256,000 jobs, another sign of the economy’s resilience. Retired Ripon College economist Paul Schoofs says many forecasters were way off projecting closer to 150,000 to 175,000 new jobs. The unemployment rate dropped to 4.1 percent from 4.2 percent in November.
