US jobs report for January is likely to show that steady hiring…

WASHINGTON (AP) – Few saw this coming. A year ago, most economists envisioned a bleak 2023 for the United States. The economy, they warned, seemed sure to falter, probably sinking into a recession, with employers adding barely 100,000 jobs a month on average, enough to keep up with population growth but not much more. No recession arrived. Instead, lots more jobs did – a monthly average last year of 225,000. The job market defied the doomsayers and shaken off the ever-higher interest rates that the Federal Reserve engineered to fight high inflation. The economy, in fact, it delivered job growth at just about the ideal pace: Fast enough to support household incomes and job security yet not so fast as…