Hiring surge at restaurants and bars helps push down US unemployment rate

Last month's uptick in hiring, which helped further lower the U.S. unemployment rate, spanned an array of industries.

Driving the gains were leisure and hospitality employers, which added 52,000 jobs. Restaurants and bars accounted for most of the surge, which suggests that "consumers are gradually loosening the purse strings," said Gregory Daco, lead U.S. economist at Oxford Economics.

Overall, employers added a solid 214,000 jobs in October, the Labor Department said Friday. The report also showed that employers added a combined 31,000 more jobs in August and September than the government had previously estimated.

The unemployment rate fell 0.1 percentage point to 5.8 percent, the lowest level since July 2008.

Every major job category has recorded cumulative job gains over the past 12 months, led by professional services, education and health, and leisure and hospitality.