US added 559,000 jobs in May as companies scrambled to hire new workers

The US added 559,000 jobs last month — fewer than the 671,000 expected by economists — as Americans continued to emerge from the pandemic and businesses scrambled to hire new workers, the feds said Friday.

The unemployment rate ticked down to 5.8 percent, according to Friday’s much-anticipated jobs report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That’s still far higher than the 50-year low of 3.5 percent reported in February before the pandemic gutted the economy. Economists expected to see the unemployment rate fall to 5.9 percent.