Washington ? Ending 2006 on a positive note, employers boosted hiring and fattened workers’ paychecks in December, capping a year in which the country’s unemployment rate averaged a six-year low of 4.6 percent.

The latest snapshot of the nation’s employment climate, released Friday by the Labor Department, suggested that most businesses held up pretty well as the real-estate bust caused the economy to lose momentum last year.

Employers added 167,000 new jobs to their payrolls in December, and the unemployment rate held steady at 4.5 percent.

The tally of jobs exceeded forecasts and was the most since September. Employment gains also turned out to have been stronger in both October and November with 29,000 more jobs being created in those two months combined than the government had estimated.

Paychecks grew briskly last month.

Workers, many of whom had seen their pay eaten by inflation, saw their average hourly earnings jump to $17.04 in December, a 0.5 percent rise from the prior month.

Over the past 12 months, wages grew by a strong 4.2 percent, a gain last exceeded in November 2000. Wages are now growing faster than consumer prices.