KHH1

By Joseph Lawler | January 8, 2015 | 9:18 am

First-time claims for unemployment benefits fell to 294,000 in the week ending Jan. 3. (iStock...
First-time claims for unemployment benefits fell to 294,000 in the week ending Jan. 3, the Department of Labor reported Thursday.

That number, which was adjusted for seasonal variation, was slightly higher than economists expected, but an improvement over the previous week, when 298,000 workers filed for benefits.

Large-scale temporary hiring by employers for the holiday season makes interpreting the underlying trend in the numbers a matter of estimation for government officials. Without adjusting for seasonal variation, there were 425,399 initial claims for the week, an increase of 35,581 from the previous week.

Following the week's decline in initial claims, the four-week moving average of seasonally-adjusted initial claims fell to 290,500.

With unemployment benefit claims well below 300,000, expectations are set for a strong jobs report Friday morning. Wall Street economists anticipate that the Bureau of Labor Statistics will report that around 245,000 new jobs for the month of December, according to Bloomberg.


The economy already added 2.65 million jobs in 2014 before December, already the best year for job creation since 1999.

Rising employment and a dropping unemployment rate have also driven down the total number of laid-off workers receiving benefits.

That number was 2,405,601 for the week ending Dec. 20, the Labor Department said in Thursday's release. That number was down from 4,205,127 a year earlier.

That improvement reflects both the tightening labor market but also the expiration of federal long-term unemployment benefits for those out of work 27 weeks or long in late December of 2013.

In recent months, layoffs and first-time claims for unemployment benefits have scraped the lowest levels in years. Advertisements for job openings have also risen by roughly a quarter over the course of the year, lifting expectations for continued acceleration in job creation.

shipfitter Loc: Wisconsin, for now

That means , More people , Ran OUT of unemployment Dickwad . Hell , You get Dumber by the Minute

KHH1

**Argue withn the newspaper....little pink dumbfuck**