- by New Deal democrat
Jobless claims, along with stock market prices and upscale consumer spending (and recently, manufacturing orders) are one of the few important metrics holding up the economy. And the short summary of this morning’s data is: the new regime of very low claims continued.
Initial claims did rise 16,000 to a still very low 219,000, and the four week moving average increased 1,500 to 209,500. With the typical one week delay, continuing claims fell sharply to 1.794 million, the lowest number in two years:
On the YoY% basis more important for forecasting purposes, initial claims were down -1.8%, the four week moving average down -6.1%, and continuing claims down -3.1%:
This is very positive - in fact, jobless claims are probably the single most positive data point in the entire economy right now. If you have a job, there is simply very little chance you are getting laid off.
Finally, let’s take an updated view of how that played into the unemployment rate in last week’s jobs report for March. As anticipated, the unemployment rate declined, by -0.1%:
Jobless claims are forecasting further declines in the unemployment rate in the next several months.
