2023-09-07 15:06:53
US weekly jobless claims fell to the lowest level since February
The number of Americans filing new applications for unemployment benefits unexpectedly fell last week to its lowest level since February, underscoring that the US labor market remains relatively tight, even as other recent data suggests that it is starting to ease. .
On Thursday, the Labor Department said first-time applications for state unemployment benefits fell to 216,000 in the week ending Sept. 2, from a revised reading of 229,000 in the previous week.
Economists polled by Archyde.com had expected new claims to rise to 234,000 in the last week.
Overall, 1.68 million people received unemployment benefits in the week ending August 26, which was regarding 40,000 fewer than the previous week, according to Bloomberg.
The US labor market, despite its gradual decline, still constitutes a vital support for the US economy, to the extent that Jerome Powell, Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank, considered it the main reason why the inflation rate remained far from its target, despite the tightening monetary policy, for more than a year and a half.
Powell noted on more than one occasion that strong hiring and limited layoffs provided consumer workers with what was needed to keep spending, fueling optimism that the US might avoid a recession.
“The jobless claims data is a reminder that labor market conditions may be cool, but the labor market remains tight,” Nancy Vanden Houten, chief US economist at Oxford Economics, wrote in a note.
Nancy said that while the Fed is likely to keep interest rates at this month’s monetary policy meeting at their levels, “more moderation in job growth will be needed to keep interest rate increases off the table.”
Claims data can see spikes from week to week, especially in weeks when there are holidays, as happened in the last week, preceding the Labor Day holiday. But the four-week moving average for initial claims fell to 229,250.
Recent data “suggests that layoffs remain sporadic and only selective,” Bloomberg’s Eliza Winger said. The labor market is slowing, but not fast enough to cause a broad wave of layoffs. Risks of rising claims persist, and may start to flicker. in yellow or even red once the stronger-than-expected activity this summer ends.”
Unit labor costs, or what a company pays employees to produce one unit of output, was revised to 2.2%, according to the US government’s Bureau of Labor Statistics.
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