Shorter Unemployment Lines?

Chart of the Week for November 7-13, 2003

The U.S. economy received another jolt of good news this week with an unexpected report of lower initial jobless claims. The report of 348,000 jobless claims this week is down 43,000 from last week and is the lowest report in 34 months. Some analysts believe a report under 400,000 indicates a stabilizing labor market. Historically, claims around 350,000 have indicated the beginning of a labor market recovery and increased hiring. A four-week moving average of the index is also used to provide a more consistent look at the market since weekly reports do not account for holidays and seasonality. The four-week moving average is 380,000, which is the lowest since early 2001. The U.S. Labor Department, who releases this index, is not completely optimistic about future employment indicators, but this low report was also not anticipated.

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