U.S. Wages Jumped 2.9% in August, More Than Expected

The U.S. unexpectedly registered its biggest increase in average hourly wages in seven years—according to Bureau of Labor Statistics figures out Friday morning—up 2.9 percent from a year earlier and the largest of the economic expansion. The nation added 201,000 jobs, exceeding analysts’ forecasts of 190,000. The unemployment rate remained unchanged at 3.9 percent. Average hourly wages were up 0.4 percent from July, which is likely to give a green light for Federal Reserve officials to raise interest rates later this month. “The labor market is still super tight,” Jennifer Lee, a senior economist at BMO Capital Markets, told Bloomberg News before the report.