One under-reported aspect of times changing oh-so-slowly for the better is the strength of Keynesian measures. Even in the face of a dogpile of cowards and craven Congressional conservatives dragging their feet – that portion of stimulus measures that was able to be implemented is having an effect.
The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits fell sharply last week to the lowest level in more than four and a half years, according to government data on Thursday that suggested improvement in the labor market…
Initial claims for state unemployment benefits fell 30,000 to a seasonally adjusted 339,000, the Labor Department said.
It was the lowest number of new claims since February 2008, about a year before Obama took office in the midst of the global financial crisis…
A Labor Department analyst noted that seasonal factors had predicted a very large increase in claims last week, which he said would be typical for the first week of the calendar quarter. Unadjusted claims did rise, but far less than expected, resulting in the sharp drop in the seasonally adjusted figure…
Economists said the labor market was showing signs of getting stronger…
Economists polled by Reuters had forecast claims edging up to 370,0000 last week. The four-week moving average for new claims, a better measure of labor market trends, fell 11,500 to 364,000…
Recent data on the U.S. labor market has been encouraging.
Employers added a modest 114,000 jobs to their payrolls in September, but the unemployment rate dropped sharply to 7.8 percent, also the lowest level since Obama took office…
