US Jobless Claims Drop 71K to 199K

U.S. jobless claims fell to their lowest level in 52 years, dropping to 199,000 for the week ending Nov. 20, the Labor Department announced Wednesday (Nov. 24).

Worker filings for initial unemployment benefits dropped 71,000 for the week. Claims averaged 218,000 a week in 2019 but shot up in 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic swept across the U.S. and around the world. Jobless claims have been dropping consistently since late September, the peak of the Delta variant of the coronavirus.

The steep decline in jobless claims and near-record numbers of job openings shows the demand for labor is increasing, Rubeela Farooqi, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics, told The Wall Street Journal.

“Claims have been moving in the right direction and are sending a positive signal about the labor market. Businesses are wary of letting go of workers amid a severe labor shortage,” she said in the news report.

U.S. employers added 531,000 jobs in October, the biggest jump in three months, while unemployment dropped from 4.8% to 4.6% for the month. Overall, the U.S. economy has more than 4 million fewer jobs than February 2020.

Job postings through mid-November on job search site Indeed were 52% higher than in February 2020, factoring in seasonal variation adjustments.

Related: October Retail Sales Beat Forecasts as Shoppers Get a Jump on the Holidays

Meanwhile, U.S. retail and food services sales in October jumped 1.7 percent to $638.2 billion, higher than economists’ forecasts, according to the Census Bureau’s Nov. 16 report. That’s the third straight month retail sales have gone up.

U.S. sales data for September was revised upward to 0.8 percent from a 0.7 percent increase. Sales were up 15.4 percent August through October compared to 2020.

Retail trade sales were up 1.9% in October from the previous month, and up 14.8% from the same time in 2020. Gas stations saw their sales numbers increase 46.8% last month from October 2020, in part due to higher fuel prices.