July 13 (UPI) — New weekly U.S. unemployment claims are down by 12,000 from the previous week, according to data released by the Department of Labor Thursday.
Seasonally adjusted claims totaled 237,000 for the week ending July 8 — lower than the comparable week a year ago, but continued claims for all unemployment programs were higher.
“The total number of continued weeks claimed for benefits in all programs for the week ending June 24 was 1,764,005, an increase of 64,431 from the previous week. There were 1,397,976 weekly claims filed for benefits in all programs in the comparable week in 2022,” the Labor Department said in a statement.
Even as hiring remains strong, inflation cooled dramatically in June, dropping to 3%. But wage growth is still strong, too, so there could still be another interest rate hike by the Fed to cool the economy because its inflation target is 2%.
States with increases of more than a thousand new weekly jobless claims were Michigan, New York, Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Tennessee, California, Georgia and Maryland.
For Michigan manufacturing layoffs were the main cause. In New York it was layoffs in n the transportation and warehousing, healthcare and social assistance, and educational services industries.
States with declines in new jobless claims of more than a thousand were Texas and New Jersey.
“The count of U.S. initial claims for unemployment insurance is a leading economic indicator because it is an indication of emerging labor market conditions in the country. However, these are weekly administrative data which are difficult to seasonally adjust, making the series subject to some volatility,” the Labor Department said.
While continued claims are not a leading economic indicator, they are a good indicator of labor market conditions, providing “confirming evidence of the direction of the U.S. economy” according to the Department of Labor.
