Initial Weekly Jobless Claims Remain High

This morning, the Department of Labor announced that initial weekly jobless claims dropped from last week’s seven-month peak, which was revised upward from 500,000 to 504,000. But this week’s claims remain high at 473,000, with the four-week moving average, smoothing out one-week blips, at 486,750. Claims need to fall into the 300,000 range to imply a decline in the overall unemployment rate, which sits at 9.5 percent and is expected to climb in the fall.

Thus, the stall-out that started in January continues, with employers continuing to avoid hiring and large number of people losing their jobs.