(RALEIGH) -- The latest U.S. jobless numbers show a slowdown in hiring, but it was enough to bring the unemployment rate down to 9 percent from 9.1 percent. NC State University Economist Dr. Mike Walden said it is not bad news but it is not good news either.

"The key number here was the fact that we did create jobs, especially private sector jobs and we've created about 3 million private sector jobs since the beginning of 2010," said Walden.  "Still, that's not recovered all of the jobs we lost during the recession but at least we're moving in the right direction, but much slower than most people would like."

The Labor Department says the U-S economy added 80,000 jobs last month, the fewest in four months and below September's revised total of 158,000.
      
Walden said things have been looking worse in North Carolina. "We don't have the numbers, the latest month's numbers out for North Carolina.  We've actually faired a little worse in the employment area in the last couple of months compared to the nation, so we'll be anticipating what happens when we got those new numbers out in a couple of weeks."