WASHINGTON — The U.S. jobs market ended 2019 on a sour note, with December's payroll and wage growth missing expectations, according to Labor Department figures released Friday.

Nonfarm payrolls increased by just 145,000 while the unemployment rate held steady at 3.5%. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been looking for job growth of 160,000. The jobless rate met expectations for staying at a 50-year low.

In addition to the slow payroll growth, average hourly earnings rose by just 2.9%, below the 3.1% projection. December marked the first time that wage gains were below 3% on a year-over-year basis since July 2018.

Revisions to the October and November counts brought those two months down by 14,000 as well. The glittering 266,000 initial estimate for November came down 10,000 while October's fell from 156,000 to 152,000.

"After a strong 256,000 gain in payrolls in November, boosted by the return of 40,000 GM workers, some slowdown in the pace of job gains in December was inevitable," Michael Pearce, senior U.S. economist at Capital Economics, said in a note. Pearce characterized the job growth as "solid" even though it missed estimates, and said "we expect solid gains in payrolls to extend through 2020."

Dow futures turned negative following the disappointing report.