Unemployment Claims

by Bespoke Investment Group

Today's initial jobless claims report was higher than expected and marked the second straight week that first time claims topped 400K. Even with the rise, however, jobless claims remain in a well-defined downtrend.

One often overlooked aspect of the weekly unemployment insurance (UI) claims report is the number of total unemployment claims. This indicator includes first time, continuing, and all other state and federal emergency UI claims. Like initial claims, this indicator has also been on the decline over the last 12 months. From the peak reading in January 2010, total UI claims have declined by 29%. However, putting this decline in perspective shows that total UI claims have a lot further to go before getting back anywhere to what were once considered normal levels. At a current level if 8.5 million, total UI claims are still more than 150% above the average weekly level from 2001 through 2007 (3.3 million).

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