Last week another 1.5 million filed for unemployment, slightly beating expectations. But last week’s number was revised downward by over 355k and the number of people collecting benefits shrunk by almost 340k:
CNBC – The pace of unemployment claims declined again last week as the U.S. jobs market continued its plodding recovery from the coronavirus pandemic, Labor Department data showed Thursday.
Initial claims totaled 1.54 million, compared to the 1.6 million expected from economists surveyed by Dow Jones and a plunge of 355,000 from the previous week’s total just shy of 1.9 million. The four-week moving average, which smooths volatility in the numbers fell by 286,250 to 2 million.
Though the total decelerated for the 10th straight week, it still represents a stunningly sharp exodus of workers to the unemployment line over the past three months. There were 705,676 claims filed under the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program.
Those collecting benefits declined by 339,000 to 20.9 million, compared to the crisis peak of 24.9 million during the week of May 9. The four-week moving average of continuing claims fell to 21.9 million, a decrease of 404,750 from a week ago.
The report comes a week after the Bureau of Labor Statistics said that nonfarm payrolls increased by 2.5 million in May, though reporting errors have cast some doubt about how aggressive the recovery has been so far.
So 1.5 million jobless claims is still far too high, but it’s less than previous week and continues to decline every week.
It’s also nice to see the number of people receiving benefits are down from 4 million from the pandemic peak.
There are now concerns that we are seeing a second wave of coronavirus cases, but in my opinion that shouldn’t be too surprising. They are going to increase when you go from people being locked in their homes to being out and about again. And with all the protesting around the US, that’s going to have an impact as well.