“We’re all sort of at the whims of these variants and surges in cases, and it’s hard to know when they might strike,” said Nick Bunker, director of economic research at the Indeed Hiring Lab. “Any sort of projections or outlook on the pace of gains over the next year or so is still dependent on the virus.”

Employment levels are still depressed compared with the period before the pandemic, even as job openings remain remarkably high by historical standards. The economy has added 18.8 million jobs since April 2020 — when pandemic-related lockdowns were at their peak — but still has 3.6 million fewer positions than in February 2020.

Part of the worker shortage may reflect retirement decisions prompted by the pandemic. Some people may be waiting to go back when health risks from the virus are less pronounced, or may be struggling to find child care during school and day care shutdowns.

Dana Ewer, 42, a nurse in Salt Lake City, said she and her husband were steeling themselves for the possibility that the day care center where they send their two sons, ages 5 and 2, would close because of a staffing shortage or virus spread.

Should that happen, or if anyone in the family got sick, she isn’t sure how they would manage work and child care during the day, she said.

“There is a possibility that I could work from home on a very temporary basis, but it would be hard to negotiate,” Ms. Ewer said, adding, “I’m more worried about what would happen with my husband.” He has just a handful of days off from work a year, and they do not know how his employer would handle a longer absence.

There was also a sharp divergence in employment along racial lines in December. White employment rose by 665,000, while Black employment fell by 86,000. The unemployment rate for Black workers rose to 7.1 percent, compared with 3.2 percent for white workers. Hispanic employment fell slightly as well.

Ransomware is joining the winter storms and coronavirus fears on the list of problems that have already disrupted schools across the country in the new year.

Finalsite, a school website services platform, was hit by a ransomware attack earlier this week. The platform said via Twitter that its security team identified ransomware on certain systems on Tuesday and it was working to prevent another attack.

Finalsite spokeswoman Morgan Delack said the platform took its own system offline — rather than wait for attackers to wreak more havoc. 

“We proactively went offline immediately upon learning of what happened in order to protect and secure our data,” said Ms. Delack in an email on Friday. “In doing so, we took approximately 5,000 school websites offline and rebuilt them in a new, safe environment. Because it was a complete reconstruction of data, it has taken some time to get up and going. At this time, the majority of our websites are back online in this new safe environment.”

Finalsite services more than 8,000 schools and universities in more than 115 countries, according to its website. Some of those institutions were still reporting issues as of Friday morning.

For example, Tulsa Public Schools in Oklahoma said via Twitter that its website had functionality issues caused by the Finalsite cyber problems.

Ms. Delack said Finalsite is working with a forensic specialist to investigate the attack, and she said Finalsite does not have evidence that data was compromised. She cited the ongoing investigation as the reason she would not answer questions about the cyberattack itself, and said the investigation could take two weeks to complete.

Educational institutions have emerged as a popular target for ransomware attackers since the coronavirus pandemic pushed more students into remote learning. Ransomware attacks against K-12 schools increased at the start of the 2020 school year, according to the Multi-State Information Sharing and Analysis Center and published on the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s website.

Higher educational institutions are also struggling to overcome cyber attackers. For example, last month, George Washington University suffered cyber breaches affecting the law school and the university’s online time reporting system.

When I first posed this question to Mr. Kumarasamy, he suggested that it was a kind of gamesmanship. I objected to that, given that plenty of people don’t feel they can afford his $75,000 or so list price but can make it work at $50,000 with that merit aid discount. How can this be gaming the system, I asked, when he doesn’t give them any sense ahead of time of whether they might get that $25,000 off?

Eventually, he came around. “What is not good for the student is not good for any of us,” he said. But he was also quick to point out the zero-sum nature of early decision; if you bail out on an acceptance, you took the spot of someone else — perhaps someone even needier than you — who would have liked a shot at getting in early in the senior year of high school and actually accepting the school’s financial aid offer.

“There’s a difference between behavior that occurs in rare instances and behavior we want to encourage,” a Northeastern spokesman, Michael Armini, said via email.

I would like to encourage that behavior a bit more than Northeastern does, and I wish college counselors in high schools would, too.

It would be so much easier if none of this parsing was necessary, but early decision is going to be with us for a while because colleges like it so much. When enrollment managers (as they now often refer to themselves) admit a large fraction of a class at a point in the process where students feel obliged to go if they get in, it gives the schools great control over precisely what sorts of students are in any given class — and how much revenue they will deliver.

So as long as we’re stuck with a highly imperfect system, schools should say what percentage of students get merit aid in the early decision round, if they have one and also offer merit aid. All schools should also say what percentage of the overall class gets merit aid and explain how they’re defining the term.

They should say that early decision is not binding, and they should pledge not to punish future applicants from high schools where former applicants walked away from an early decision acceptance. They should also clarify whether they have a problem with people who decline an early decision offer because they didn’t get enough merit aid.

The Coca-Cola Company is adding a new ingredient to its Fresca citrus soda: alcohol.

Corona’s Constellation Brands brewer is partnering with Coke to release a canned cocktail version called Fresca Mixed later this year.

In 2020, Coke released Topo Chico hard seltzer, its first canned alcoholic carbonated beverage.

In response to a request for comment on Friday, the Coca-Cola company referred The Washington Times back to its news release.

Bill Newlands, Constellation’s president and chief executive officer, said in the joint statement that Fresca responds to “consumer preferences for refreshment, flavor, and convenience” in a way that the companies hope to leverage in the alcohol market.

Constellation and Coke said in the statement that they are spiking Fresca because the popular diet soda is “experiencing a surge in popularity” among cocktail aficionados as a zero-calorie, no-sugar mixer.

The companies said Fresca Mixed will be “inspired by recipes created by Fresca fans from around the globe,” but did not confirm what flavors will be released.

Notable Fresca-based cocktails include Bravo television host Andy Cohen’s “Frequila,” a mix of tequila and Fresca.

Canned cocktail sales grew 53% last year and are projected to grow another 29% over the next three years, according to data from IWSR Drinks Analysis. Constellation estimates that the new Fresca Mixed will tap into an $8 billion market that is already outpacing hard seltzers in popularity.

Coke’s rival Pepsi entered the canned cocktail market last year with “HARD MTN DEW,” a sugar-free variant of its popular Mountain Dew soda with 5% alcohol by volume that it is developing with the Boston Beer Company.

Coke introduced Fresca in 1966 as a diet sugar-free alternative to its regular sodas.

President Biden on Friday shrugged off the worst jobs report of his presidency as the U.S. economy added less than half the number of jobs expected in December amid a massive surge in COVID-19 cases.

Mr. Biden showed up about an hour late for his speech and emphasized the report’s lone bright spot, that unemployment dropped slightly to 3.9% in December from 4.2% in November, even though economists say that reflects fewer people seeking work.

“Today is a historic day for economic recovery,” Mr. Biden said, calling the drop the sharpest one-year drop in U.S. history. “I would argue that the Biden economic plan is working and America is getting back to work, back on its feet.”

But the Labor Department report showed the U.S. added just 199,000 jobs in December. That was the fewest jobs in any month of 2021 and the worst month of job creation since December 2020, when the country shed 306,000 jobs.

Economists had expected about 422,000 jobs would be added last month after several weeks of reduced unemployment claims and signs private-sector payrolls were increasing.

At the end of the year, the U.S. was still down about 3.6 million jobs compared to before the pandemic in February 2020.

It is the second straight disappointing jobs report for Mr. Biden.

Labor force participation remained unchanged at 61.9%, a surprising result given the ongoing labor shortage in the U.S.

Republicans seized on the poor jobs report as evidence Mr. Biden’s policies hurt the economy.

“Another disappointing jobs report proves President Biden bungled the economy in 2021,” Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas, the top Republican on the Ways and Means Committee, said in a statement. “One thing is certain: His $5 trillion tax hikes and spending spree would make the economy worse by raising prices, killing jobs, and slowing economic growth.”

The Job Creators Network, a conservative advocacy group that promotes small and large businesses, called the jobs report “a huge miss.”

“The reason for this disaster is simple: Biden’s destructive economic policies are killing the American work ethic while making it harder for small businesses to recoup the losses they experienced during Covid,” the group said in a statement. “Yet, Biden and the Democrats continue to push for more taxes, more spending, and more [vaccine] mandates.”

Mr. Biden pivoted from the bad jobs news to promoting his social welfare and climate change bill known as the Build Back Better Act, which is stuck in limbo without enough support from Senate Democrats to pass.

“I’m working to reduce the largest cost burden on household budgets, costs that don’t need to be such a burden,” Mr. Biden said. “And the biggest weapon in that arsenal is my Build Back Better Act, which will reduce what families have to pay for basic necessities to live a life.”

Rising omicron variant infections are threatening the economy as employers close businesses and consumers pull back from spending on restaurants, hotels and airlines.

However, the December jobs report doesn’t reflect omicron’s complete impact on the economy. The report is based on two surveys conducted by the Labor Department the week of Dec. 12, before cases spiked in major cities.

Job creation was highest in the leisure and hospitality sectors, which added 53,000 jobs in December. Still, that number was well short of the more than 100,000 jobs the sector was adding earlier this year. The industry remains down 1.2 million positions compared with pre-pandemic levels.

Professional and business services, manufacturing and construction, and transportation and warehousing all reported solid job gains, while health care hiring remained stagnant.

Retailers lost about 2,100 jobs last month. Sporting goods and hobby stores saw the largest decline, shedding about 12,500 jobs, the Labor Department said.

Government jobs also decreased by about 12,000 due to declines in state and local government employment.