U.S. Jobless Claims Remained Low Last Week
New applications for unemployment benefits held nearly steady last week just above historic lows as employers continued to avoid layoffs in a still-tight labor market.
Initial jobless claims, a proxy for layoffs, decreased by 3,000 to 229,000 last week from the previous week’s revised level of 232,000, the Labor Department said Thursday.
The four-week average of new claims, which smooths volatility in the weekly figures, also rose slightly by 2,750 to 218,500 last week, nearly matching the prepandemic average from 2019. That figure hasn’t seen a decrease since early April.
Continuing claims, a proxy for the total number of people receiving payments from state unemployment programs, rose slightly to 1.3 million in the week ended June 4, but still remained near a historic low. The level of insured unemployment has steadily fallen from 1.7 million in early January. Continuing claims are reported with a one-week lag.
The U.S. labor market remains on strong footing, though there are early signs economic growth is slowing. U.S. employers added 390,000 jobs in May—a robust gain that was also well below the average monthly pace of job growth over the past six months. U.S. retail sales dropped in May for the first monthly decline this year.
The Federal Reserve on Wednesday approved the largest interest-rate increase since 1994 as it attempts to cool the economy and fight high inflation—an effort that also could increase unemployment.
“The economy has a decent amount of momentum right now, but you can already see some cracks,” said
Joshua Shapiro,
chief U.S. economist at forecasting firm Maria Fiorini Ramirez Inc. “It’s going to be a tug of war between how fast the economy slows down and this ongoing need to hire people.”
Mr. Shapiro said he expects consumer demand to remain strong throughout the summer despite high inflation, which would sustain high demand for labor. A smaller pool of available workers compared with the size of the labor force before the Covid-19 pandemic remains an issue for the labor market, he added.
Employers had 11.4 million job openings in April, a decline of nearly half a million openings from the prior month. That equaled to about 1.9 job openings for every unemployed person seeking work. Meanwhile, the number of times workers quit their jobs inched lower to 4.4 million in May.
Steve Preston, president and chief executive of Goodwill Industries International, a nonprofit organization that sells used goods and provides job training, said “we’re still behind where we’d like to be in terms of hiring.”
Mr. Preston said payrolls at the organization’s roughly 600 centers in North America were still down more than 10% by the end of May compared with before the pandemic, which includes retail and logistics jobs. He said that to retain workers, the organization has offered pay increases and personal development opportunities.
“In many cases, we’ve tried to figure out how to do the work with fewer people,” Mr. Preston said.
Write to Bryan Mena at [email protected]
Copyright ©2022 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8
New applications for unemployment benefits held nearly steady last week just above historic lows as employers continued to avoid layoffs in a still-tight labor market.
Initial jobless claims, a proxy for layoffs, decreased by 3,000 to 229,000 last week from the previous week’s revised level of 232,000, the Labor Department said Thursday.
The four-week average of new claims, which smooths volatility in the weekly figures, also rose slightly by 2,750 to 218,500 last week, nearly matching the prepandemic average from 2019. That figure hasn’t seen a decrease since early April.
Continuing claims, a proxy for the total number of people receiving payments from state unemployment programs, rose slightly to 1.3 million in the week ended June 4, but still remained near a historic low. The level of insured unemployment has steadily fallen from 1.7 million in early January. Continuing claims are reported with a one-week lag.
The U.S. labor market remains on strong footing, though there are early signs economic growth is slowing. U.S. employers added 390,000 jobs in May—a robust gain that was also well below the average monthly pace of job growth over the past six months. U.S. retail sales dropped in May for the first monthly decline this year.
The Federal Reserve on Wednesday approved the largest interest-rate increase since 1994 as it attempts to cool the economy and fight high inflation—an effort that also could increase unemployment.
“The economy has a decent amount of momentum right now, but you can already see some cracks,” said
Joshua Shapiro,
chief U.S. economist at forecasting firm Maria Fiorini Ramirez Inc. “It’s going to be a tug of war between how fast the economy slows down and this ongoing need to hire people.”
Mr. Shapiro said he expects consumer demand to remain strong throughout the summer despite high inflation, which would sustain high demand for labor. A smaller pool of available workers compared with the size of the labor force before the Covid-19 pandemic remains an issue for the labor market, he added.
Employers had 11.4 million job openings in April, a decline of nearly half a million openings from the prior month. That equaled to about 1.9 job openings for every unemployed person seeking work. Meanwhile, the number of times workers quit their jobs inched lower to 4.4 million in May.
Steve Preston, president and chief executive of Goodwill Industries International, a nonprofit organization that sells used goods and provides job training, said “we’re still behind where we’d like to be in terms of hiring.”
Mr. Preston said payrolls at the organization’s roughly 600 centers in North America were still down more than 10% by the end of May compared with before the pandemic, which includes retail and logistics jobs. He said that to retain workers, the organization has offered pay increases and personal development opportunities.
“In many cases, we’ve tried to figure out how to do the work with fewer people,” Mr. Preston said.
Write to Bryan Mena at [email protected]
Copyright ©2022 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8
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