The Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report has been released. We continue our move in the wrong direction. New claims rose to 576,000, which was above the Bloomberg consensus range of 545K to 559K. From the report:

In the week ending Aug. 15, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 576,000, an increase of 15,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 561,000. The 4-week moving average was 570,000, an increase of 4,250 from the previous week’s revised average of 565,750.

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 4.7 percent for the week ending Aug. 8, unchanged from the prior week’s unrevised rate of 4.7 percent.

The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending Aug. 8 was 6,241,000, an increase of 2,000 from the preceding week’s revised level of 6,239,000. The 4-week moving average was 6,266,000, a decrease of 2,500 from the preceding week’s revised average of 6,268,500.

Last week’s initial claims number was revised up 3,000. The seasonally adjusted numbers have now been increasing for two weeks running, just at the point when it’s time to start believing in the seasonally adjusted trends. The unadjusted numbers are worth looking at. Fortunately, they are moving in the opposite direction:

The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 454,216 in the week ending Aug. 15, a decrease of 28,406 from the previous week. There were 343,169 initial claims in the comparable week in 2008.

The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 4.4 percent during the week ending Aug. 8, unchanged from the prior week. The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 5,798,001, a decrease of 97,650 from the preceding week. A year earlier, the rate was 2.4 percent and the volume was 3,160,610.

The initial claims number is good, but the total claims number is still concerning. As previously mentioned, benefits are expiring for a number of people (500,000 by the end of September).

The good / bad lists are not as encouraging as the previous two weeks:

The good list (-1000 or more): CA, MI

The bad list (+1000 or more): MA, NY, TX, SC, PR, WA, GA, WI, NC, TN

TN (the worst) was +2,525 vs CA (the best) at -5,635. The trade and service industries seemed to dominate the bad comments, but the changes were each fairly small.

States are doing their best to try to extend benefits. Michigan has no money, so they are calling on congress. Alabama will try to use stimulus money. Missouri extended benefits (a severe drain on state coffers) too early for stimulus support, and appears stuck. West Virginia succeeding in extending benefits and getting stimulus dollars to pay for it. The situation is not as grim as it might seem (but it’s close!). Extending benefits for state is not zero sum in the short term—the spending on extended benefits doesn’t automatically mean state budget cuts elsewhere results in additional unemployment. There is some ability for the states to borrow from the Federal Government. California is already in the hole several billion dollars. There are limits, though. It all must eventually be paid back.

This week’s bottom line, same as last week: The absolute numbers are still high and moving higher, but expiring benefits should be dominating any unemployment discussion.