Today's jobless claims report by the numbers

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As with most Thursdays, today we had the jobless claims report. The headlines seemed ecstatic that there were ”only” 550,000 jobless claims last week. While that was the 35th week in a row of claims above 500,000, it was greeted with some enthusiasm since it was a lower number than expected by 15,000. What is equally surprising is that the revised number for last week was higher at 576,000 or 6,000 more than reported. It appears that the revised number is always higher than the reported number, but it seems to have less affect on perception that the initially reported number.

It’s important to remember that it takes the creation of 130,000 (rounded) jobs a month to merely keep pace with worker age population increases. So if the country is still losing 550,000 jobs a week and not creating the (130,000/4) 32,500 needed to break even, then the total job deficit for the week can be totaled to 582,000. If you don’t like that calculation and you want to go by the monthly job figure, then for August we lost 216,000 jobs and didn’t create the 130,000 needed for a total deficit of 346,000 jobs. No matter how you cut the job loss numbers, they are still ugly.

U.S. Initial Jobless Claims Fell to 550,000 Last Week


(T)he national economy has failed to add the 127,000 jobs per month needed to keep up with population growth.


Lastly, the continuing claims number, which saw a decrease of 159,000 on the benefit rolls, was also heralded as a major improvement, not taking into account that the number of people exhausting their unemployment benefits is the main reason behind the slide in continuing claims.

500,000 Will Exhaust Unemployment Benefits by September, 1.5 Million by Year-end

So while there is some improvement in the job numbers, especially compared to the first quarter of the year, it’s still very difficult times for the job market.

Eventually this jobless recovery will end and let’s hope that end is sooner rather than later.

Be sure to check out AllPinkSlips Layoffs List for the latest on job cuts.

For those of you looking for a job, pay a visit to the AllPinkSlips Find a Job area.

Are you seeing improved job conditions in your area? Is your company hiring? Are your friends more positive about their job prospects?