Jobless claims: Another 230,000 Americans filed new claims last week

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Source: Yahoo! Finance

Yahoo Finance

Jobless claims: Another 230,000 Americans filed new claims last week

Emily McCormick · Reporter
Thu, January 13, 2022, 8:31 AM

Initial unemployment claims unexpectedly jumped to total 230,000 last week.

The Labor Department released its latest weekly jobless claims report Thursday at 8:30 a.m. ET. Here were the main metrics from the print, compared to consensus estimates compiled by Bloomberg:

-- Initial jobless claims, week ended Jan. 8: 230,000 vs. 200,000 expected, 207,000 during prior week

-- Continuing claims, week ended Jan. 2: 1.559 million vs. 1.733 million expected, 1.754 million during prior week

Despite the rise in filings for first-time unemployment claims, jobless claims have held near or below their pre-virus levels for more than a month, underscoring the continued slowdown in firings and other involuntary separations as employers retain their existing workforces. New claims had averaged around 220,000 per week throughout 2019. And in early December, weekly claims had improved to come in below 190,000 for the lowest since 1969.

"The underlying trend is still falling; we expect new lows at the end of the month," Ian Shepherdson, chief economist for Pantheon Macroeconomics, wrote in a note earlier this week.

Continuing claims, which track the total number of Americans claiming benefits on regular state programs, also edged higher in the latest weekly data, but have still improved to near pre-pandemic levels. The four-week moving average for continuing claims, which helps smooth out volatility in the weekly data, came in just below 1.8 million for the week ended Dec. 25, marking the lowest level since March 14, 2020.

The latest weekly jobless claims data comes amid a bevy of labor market prints showing demand -- and leverage -- for many workers remains strong. Last week's monthly jobs report showed a bigger-than-expected improvement in the unemployment rate to 3.9%, or the lowest level since February 2020. And though monthly payroll gains have slowed, many economists have attributed this to a lack of available workers to fill vacancies, rather than a lack of desire for additional workers.

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Read more: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/weekly-unemployment-claims-week-ended-jan-8-2022-233140248.html

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Here are this morning's banner and yesterday's placeholder article:

COMING UP Jobless claims preview: Another 200,000 Americans likely filed new claims last week
Check back at 8:30 a.m. ET for results

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https://finance.yahoo.com/news/weekly-unemployment-claims-week-ended-jan-8-2022-233140248.html

Yahoo Finance

Jobless claims preview: Another 200,000 Americans likely filed new claims last week

Emily McCormick · Reporter
Wed, January 12, 2022, 6:31 PM

Initial unemployment claims likely totaled 200,000 last week to come in below pre-pandemic levels yet again, affirming the labor market's remaining recovery depends not on worker demand, but on supply. ... The Labor Department will release its latest weekly jobless claims report Thursday at 8:30 a.m. ET. Here are the main metrics expected from the print, compared to consensus estimates compiled by Bloomberg:

--Initial jobless claims, week ended Jan. 8: 200,000 expected, 207,000 during prior week

--Continuing claims, week ended Jan. 2: 1.733 million expected, 1.754 million during prior week

Despite the modest rise in filings for first-time unemployment claims last week, jobless claims have held at or below their pre-virus levels for more than a month, underscoring the continued slowdown in firings and other involuntary separations as employers retain their existing workforces. New claims had averaged around 220,000 per week throughout 2019. And in early December, weekly claims had improved to come in below 190,000 for the lowest since 1969. ... "The underlying trend is still falling; we expect new lows at the end of the month," Ian Shepherdson, chief economist for Pantheon Macroeconomics, wrote in a note.

Continuing claims, which track the total number of Americans claiming benefits on regular state programs, also edged higher in the latest weekly data, but have still improved to near pre-pandemic levels. The four-week moving average for continuing claims, which helps smooth out volatility in the weekly data, came at just below 1.8 million for the latest week ended Dec. 25, marking the lowest level since March 14, 2020.

The latest weekly jobless claims data comes amid a bevy of labor market prints showing demand -- and leverage -- for many workers remains strong. Last week's monthly jobs report showed a bigger-than-expected improvement in the unemployment rate to 3.9%, or the lowest level since February 2020. And though monthly payroll gains have slowed, many economists have attributed this to a lack of available workers to fill vacancies, rather than a lack of desire for additional workers.

{snip}

[mahatmakanejeeves]

1. From the source:

They've changed the text just a little. The program contact person and number have changed. The change was made last week. Last week's report was the first with the new name and number.

Hat tip to the new guy, Kevin Stapleton.

https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf

News Release

Connect with DOL at
https://blog.dol.gov

TRANSMISSION OF MATERIALS IN THIS RELEASE IS EMBARGOED UNTIL
8:30 A.M. (Eastern) Thursday, January 13, 2022

UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE WEEKLY CLAIMS

SEASONALLY ADJUSTED DATA

In the week ending January 8, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 230,000, an increase of 23,000 from the previous week's unrevised level of 207,000. The 4-week moving average was 210,750, an increase of 6,250 from the previous week's unrevised average of 204,500.

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 1.1 percent for the week ending January 1, a decrease of 0.2 percentage point from the previous week's unrevised rate. The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending January 1 was 1,559,000, a decrease of 194,000 from the previous week's revised level. This is the lowest level for insured unemployment since June 2, 1973 when it was 1,556,000. The previous week's level was revised down by 1,000 from 1,754,000 to 1,753,000. The 4-week moving average was 1,721,500, a decrease of 77,000 from the previous week's revised average. This is the lowest level for this average since March 7, 2020 when it was 1,714,500. The previous week's average was revised down by 250 from 1,798,750 to 1,798,500.

{snip}

UNADJUSTED DATA

{snip}

The total number of continued weeks claimed for benefits in all programs for the week ending December 25 was 1,948,624, an increase of 226,264 from the previous week. There were 19,377,528 weekly claims filed for benefits in all programs in the comparable week in 2020.

{snip the rest of the twelve-page news release, until the end}

Weekly Claims Archives
Weekly Claims Data

U.S. Department of Labor news materials are accessible at http://www.dol.gov. The Department's Reasonable Accommodation Resource Center converts Departmental information and documents into alternative formats, which include Braille and large print. For alternative format requests, please contact the Department at [phone] (voice) or [phone] (federal relay).

U.S. Department of Labor
Employment and Training Administration
Washington, D.C. 20210
Release Number: USDL 22-62-NAT

Program Contacts:
Kevin Stapleton: [phone]
Media Contact: [phone]

[doc03]

2. Here we go again "another 230,000 filed for unemployment last week". So, if you add all these

additional job loses together everyone in the USA should be out of work by now. Yahoo Finance does this every week.

[LenaBaby61]

4. I'm SO tired of these corporate, right-winged news corporations et al ...

[progree]

3. Continuing claims down by 11.1%

-- Continuing claims, week ended Jan. 2: 1.559 million vs. ... , 1.754 million during prior week