The Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report has been released. The Bloomberg consensus was 609,000 with a range of 590,000 to 625,000. The actual number surprised to the upside at 637,000. Bloomberg reports Jobless Claims in U.S. Increase More Than Forecast:
More Americans than forecast filed first-time claims for unemployment insurance last week, mainly reflecting a jump in applications related to the Chrysler LLC bankruptcy.
Initial jobless claims rose by 32,000 to 637,000 in the week ended May 9, from a revised 605,000 the prior week, the Labor Department said today in Washington. A “good part” of the jump was from states reporting an increase in auto-related claims, a Labor spokesman said without providing a more precise estimate.
The total number of people collecting unemployment insurance surged in the prior week to 6.56 million, setting a record for the 15th straight week, and indicating companies are still not hiring. The lack of jobs threatens to restrain consumer spending, the biggest part of the economy, and delay a return to growth that economists project for later this year.
There doesn’t appear to be any green shoots while “setting a record for the 15th straight week.” The unadjusted data (the data that corresponds to actual people instead of trends) is slightly better. From the actual report:
The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 565,395 in the week ending May 9, an increase of 27,856 from the previous week. There were 325,480 initial claims in the comparable week in 2008.
The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 4.6 percent during the week ending May 2, a decrease of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week. The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 6,166,785, a decrease of 95,837 from the preceding week. A year earlier, the rate was 2.1 percent and the volume was 2,845,952.
The decrease in the insured unemployment rate actually makes last week’s report look a little better. 95,837 is a significant number, and I’m a little surprised it could be adjusted away. The story remains that hiring is still weak. This is going to have one important change: At some point soon there should be about 60,000 census jobs. I don’t know the specific hiring time line (or geographic distribution), but I’m sure there will be headlines announcing it, so be advised (jobseekers: hint, hint).
Looking at the good/bad list, I must question the Bloomberg article.
The good list (-1000 or more): NY, MI, NC, MA, CT, GA, VA, AL, CA, KY, SC
The bad list (+1000 or more): OH, IN, PR, KS, IL
IL (the worst) was +2,052 vs NY (the best) at -13,386.
MI was -10,952, with the note “Fewer layoffs in the automobile industry,” while IN had +1,051 while blaming the auto industry. It’s not supported to blame the auto industry when the change for Michigan alone, due to decreased auto layoffs, wipes out the changes for the entire bad list. It’s important to recognize that this breakdown is associated with last week’s claims. But, it looks like this data is the anomaly, not the new claims this week. Next week’s report should be illuminating.
