- by New Deal democrat
As per my usual practice for the past several months, let’s look at initial jobless claims to see if there are any signs of stress.
My two thresholds are:
1. If the four week average on claims is more than 10% above its expansion low.
2. If the YoY% change in the monthly average turns higher.
Here’s this week’s update.
Initial jobless claims last week were 215,000. This is in the lower part of its range for the past 18 months. As of this week, the four week average is 6.5% above its recent low:
Additionally, the YoY change for the month of August as a whole (red) is -250 below where it was last year (weekly YoY change is shown in blue):
The less leading but also less volatile 4 week average of continuing claims rose slightly, and remains slightly (-2.0%) below its level of one year ago:
In summary, jobless claims have steadfastly remained positive, if very weakly so, against the toughest comparisons from one year ago. There is no imminent economic downturn so long as this remains the case.
