US jobless rate falls to three-year low as 200,000 Americans find jobs The country's unemployment rate declined to 8.5pc last month as 200,000 Americans found jobs. Economists had predicted a rise of about 150,000 for the month. There was encouragement taken as the gains were across the manufacturing and services sectors, with the number of jobs created by companies reaching 212,000. The government cut 12,000 jobs in the month. The better-than-expected figure will raise hopes that 2012 may be the year in which US growth emerges from the stop-start pattern that has characterised the last two years. Unemployment in America has remained stubbornly high even though the recession technically finished in the summer of 2009. And less than a third of the 8.75m jobs that were lost to the recession have since been recovered. That, in turn, has cast a shadow over the rest of the economy as Americans remain cautious about spending. The scale of unemployment will be a defining theme of the Presidential election in November, with those Republicans vying to take on Barack Obama lambasting his record on the economy.