Continuing claims had a historic week as claims fell to lows not seen since 1970, according to the Department of Labor…(DOL)
- Continuing claims saw a substantial drop to 1.476M for the week ending February 12th, a decrease of 122,00 from the previous week’s revised levels. This is the lowest level for insured unemployment since March 14, 1970 when it was 1,456,000.
- Economists had projected a much smaller drop to 1.58M.
Initial claims also saw a drop after a slight increase last week…
- Initial jobless claims fell to 232,000 for the week ending February 19th, a decrease of 12,000 from the previous week’s revised levels.
- Economists had projected that rates would fall to 235,000 claims.
Missouri saw the biggest decrease in initial claims with 6,946 fewer claims than the previous week followed by New York (-2,990) and Ohio (-2,319).
- Michigan saw the biggest increase in claims up 3.554 from the previous week followed by Kansas (+629) and Utah (+454).