The U.S. added 661,000 jobs in September, the Labor Department said Friday in the final jobs report before the November 3 presidential election.

The unemployment rate dropped to 7.9 percent last month, after peaking at 14.7 percent in April, according to the report.

The gain in jobs did not live up to experts’ expectations: economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been expecting 800,000 jobs to be added, though the unemployment rate performed better than expected as economists had predicted a drop to 8.2 percent from 8.4 percent in August.

September’s growth marks a slowing recovery for the labor market, which had added 4.8 million jobs in June but slowed to 1.8 million in July and 1.4 million in August.

Editor’s Note: A previous version of this article said 661,000 million jobs had been added in September, when in fact 661,000 jobs had been added.