This Energizer Bunny of an economy just keeps rolling along, creating 166,000 jobs last month - twice what was predicted:The Labor Department's report, released Friday, also showed that the unemployment rate held steady at 4.7 percent for the second month in a row. It's a figure that is considered low by historical standards. Job gains were logged for professional and business services, education and health care, leisure and hospitality, and for the government. Those employment increases more than offset jobs losses in manufacturing, construction and retail — casualties of the problems plaguing the housing market. The latest snapshot of employment conditions around the country was better than economists were anticipating. Economists were forecasting payrolls to grow in October by about half the pace seen — around 80,000. They did correctly predict the unemployment rate would be unchanged.Good news on jobs was slightly offset by disappointing news on wages: Still, the trend...(Read Full Post)