Posted on 06/13/2013 7:31:44 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
In a positive sign for the U.S. jobs market, the Labor Department released a report on Thursday showing that first-time claims for unemployment benefits unexpectedly decreased in the week ended June 8th.
The Labor Department said initial jobless claims fell to 334,000, a decrease of 12,000 from the previous week's unrevised figure of 346,000.
The modest decrease came as a surprise to economists, who had been expecting initial jobless claims to edge up to 350,000.
With the unexpected decrease, jobless claims fell for the second consecutive week, pulling back toward the five-year low of 327,000 set in the week ended April 27th.
The report also showed that the less volatile four-week moving average dipped to 345,250, a decrease of 7,250 from the previous week's unrevised average of 352,500.
Chris Low, chief economist at FTN Financial, said, "Both claims and the four-week average are higher than they were in early April, but the drop is consistent with a gradually falling trend in the rate of layoffs."
Meanwhile, continuing claims, a reading on the number of people receiving ongoing unemployment assistance, edged up to 2.973 million in the week ended June 1st from the preceding week's revised level of 2.971 million.
(Excerpt) Read more at rttnews.com ...
So true. The jobless claims at this point probably reflect a fair amount of churning in the economy. It would be interesting to see how long they held jobs before being laid off. Is it long term jobs we are still losing or short term jobs. How do desperate people who reapply for benefits but who aren't eligible get counted?
In addition to food, lodging, etc., there must be plenty of $$$ in unemployment payments; most job seekers we see can’t pass a drug test.
If someone said that to me, I would have told him that the job offer was rescinded.
I wish you were being sarcastic.
You can't "drop off" something that doesn't include you in the first place. In other words, a decrease in the average number of apples does not apply to oranges. This statistic is called "first-time claims for unemployment benefits" [emphasis added].
Good question. They probably go bankrupt and lose their house. Terrible things are happening. Its the great depression all over again except that the MSM just hides it. With the social safety nets you don’t see the people out panhandling on the streets or standing in line for the soup kitchen. Otherwise likely no difference. When we can’t borrow any more money for this stuff the cities will be on fire.
you have a guy in the Whitehouse making sure that no new jobs get created. That is his job make no mistake. If Obama was concerned about jobs wouldn’t he be doing things to try to stimulate the economy instead of just flying around the country to fund raisers every day?
He’s never in the Oval Office except for a photo op. So if he does not get impeached you are looking at 3.5 years of more of the same. What will be left at that point? We will probably have a total economic collapse and CWII at the rate we are going.
They had all the answers, still do if you ask 'em. They never imagined their methods would not work (for the umpteenth time it has been tried). Now they have no recourse but to borrow and print.
Yes, terrible things are happening, but not to the welfare/unemployment/disability recipients. The ones that are REALLY suffering are the ones who work and save; now savings are being cannibalized to pay mortgages and taxes. Even people lucky enough to have jobs are finding that the prices of food and energy are killing them.
When people drop off the unemployment rolls they stop counting them. It does not mean they got a job but it it improves the unemployment numbers.
Completely false, and probably the most common misconception about how the unemployment rate actually is calculated. I can provide a link layer if you wish.
The weekly manure stats from a trustworthy government.
Basically, whether or not you are eligible for unemployment compensation (or whether you are receiving it, or whether you stopped receiving it), is not a factor in the calculation of the unemployment rate. The main reason is that not everybody is eligible for compensation in the first place. So statistically, if you used it as a factor, you would be doing the equivalent of taking a snapshot with your finger covering half of the lens.
Bureau of Labor StatisticsThe UI [unemployment insurance] figures are not produced by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Statistics on insured unemployment in the United States are collected as a by-product of UI programs. Workers who lose their jobs and are covered by these programs typically file claims ("initial claims") that serve as notice that they are beginning a period of unemployment. Claimants who qualify for benefits are counted in the insured unemployment figures (as "continued claims"). Data on UI claims are maintained by the Employment and Training Administration, an agency of the U.S. Department of Labor, and are available on the Internet at: http://workforcesecurity.doleta.gov/unemploy/claims.asp.
These data are not used to measure total unemployment because they exclude several important groups. To begin with, not all workers are covered by UI programs. For example, self-employed workers, unpaid family workers, workers in certain not-for-profit organizations, and several other small (primarily seasonal) worker categories are not covered. In addition, the insured unemployed exclude the following:
- Unemployed workers who have exhausted their benefits
- Unemployed workers who have not yet earned benefit rights (such as new entrants or reentrants to the labor force)
- Disqualified workers whose unemployment is considered to have resulted from their own actions rather than from economic conditions; for example, a worker discharged for misconduct on the job
- Otherwise eligible unemployed persons who do not file for benefits
Okay, I had read an article concerning Wal-Mart this morning and within that article it pointed out that the Unemployment Rate had risen. So, here’s the link:
http://sweetness-light.com/archive/wal-mart-is-now-only-hiring-temporary-workers
Two things can be said about the report about Wal-Mart hiring.
1) If you are currently unemployed but are not actively looking or have been turned down so often that you are discouraged and have given up looking, YOU ARE NOT COUNTED IN THE OFFICIAL UNEMPLOYMENT RATE.
2) If you are working part time, even a few hours a week as a temp ( as in working for Wal-Mart as a temp ) YOU ARE NOT COUNTED IN THE OFFICIAL UNEMPLOYMENT RATE.
All the above combine to make the official unemployment rate look BETTER than it really is.
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