Employers made deeper cuts in their payrolls in September, according to the Labor Department's monthly jobs report, as the economy experienced the biggest drop in jobs in more than five years.

There was a net loss of 159,000 jobs in September, the ninth straight month the U.S. economy has lost jobs. The August job loss was revised to 73,000 jobs, taking year-to-date job losses to 760,000.

The unemployment rate remained at 6.1%, the same level as August and in line with economists' forecast.

Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had forecast the loss of 105,000 jobs in the month. It was the largest monthly job loss total since March 2003, when payrolls were down 212,000, and the second-largest decline since the months that followed the Sept. 11 terrorist attack in late 2001.

Job losses were again widespread. Manufacturing lost 51,000 jobs while construction employment shrank further by 35,000 jobs. But retailers also trimmed payrolls by 40,000 workers, and the leisure and hospitality industries cut 17,000 jobs.

Professional and business services, a catch-all category seen by some as a proxy for overall economic activity, had a 27,000 drop in employment.

The only two major sectors to post gains were government, which added 9,000 jobs, and education and health services, in which employment grew by 25,000. Government hiring has stayed strong throughout the downturn, as the private sector has now lost nearly a million jobs since December, when employers started cutting back.

In another sign of weakness, the average hourly work week slipped by 0.1 hour to 33.6 hours. And a modest 3-cent gain in the average hourly salary, combined with the shorter week, means that the average weekly paycheck fell by 81 cents to $610.51. Both the work week and hourly wage gains were weaker than forecasts.

"Incomes being crimped will feed back to weaken spending. And that will feed back into more job losses," said Robert Brusca of FAO Economics. "It is vicious circle time."

While the unemployment rate did not increase, other measures of the number of workers without the jobs they wanted rose. Those working part-time jobs because they couldn't find full-time work or their hours had been cut back due to slack business conditions jumped by 337,000 people to 6.1 million.

The so-called under-employment rate, which counts those part-time workers, as well as those without jobs who have become discouraged and stopped looking for work, rose to 11% from from 10.7%, the highest rate in that measure since April 1994.

And as bad as the government report was for those seeking work, there are worries among economists that worse readings lay ahead.

The report is based on surveys of employers and households conducted in the week of Sept. 8 to 12, a period before the worst of the current financial crisis hit Wall Street. That crisis caused banks to hoard cash and cut back on credit extended to businesses.

Fears that the credit crunch will cause widespread job losses and a severe downturn in the already struggling economy prompted Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke to push for a $700 billion Wall Street bailout.

The measure, which passed the Senate Wednesday night, was voted down in the House on Monday. But the House is set to vote on the measure again Friday.