This week’s Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report has been released with no surprises. We’re still effectively moving sideways. We are above where we were just a few weeks ago. New claims came in at 453k while last week’s number was revised up 3k. New claims were inside the Bloomberg consensus range of 445k to 475k. From the report:

In the week ending May 29, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 453,000, a decrease of 10,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 463,000. The 4-week moving average was 459,000, an increase of 1,750 from the previous week’s revised average of 457,250.

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.6 percent for the week ending May 22, unchanged from the prior week’s unrevised rate of 3.6 percent.

The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending May 22 was 4,666,000, an increase of 31,000 from the preceding week’s revised level of 4,635,000. The 4-week moving average was 4,654,000, an increase of 9,750 from the preceding week’s revised average of 4,644,250.

It is increasingly difficult to remain optimistic with these numbers. What once appeared to be an easing down with a few disruptions along the way is beginning to look like a repeating cycle. The employment environment is at a volatility level correlated with job losses (anything above 400k new claims). The unadjusted numbers are not much consolation this week:

The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 410,302 in the week ending May 29, an increase of 3,427 from the previous week. There were 500,380 initial claims in the comparable week in 2009.

The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.4 percent during the week ending May 22, unchanged from the prior week. The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 4,330,107, a decrease of 77,692 from the preceding week. A year earlier, the rate was 4.5 percent and the volume was 6,033,293.

When the disruptions were due to the seasonal adjustments, there was some justification for optimism. Now the seasonal adjustments are the source of improvement.

The good / bad lists are consistent with last week’s unadjusted data:

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

The bad list (+1000 or more): MO, NY

NY (the worst) was +1,556 vs MI (the best) at -2,269. Manufacturing is the only member of the big four (service, trade, manufacturing, and construction) that gets lopsided representation. Fortunately, it’s in the good list. That’s two weeks in a row. Maybe we’ll get a stronger ISM report next month after all.

In other news, the House passed the unemployment benefits extension bill before heading out on vacation. The Senate did not, but it will likely pass with retroactive coverage. As a reminder, this only brings up remaining states to the 99 week limit, it does not introduce tier V benefits.

Also, tomorrow’s jobs report will be quite strong. Some analysts are predicting that in light of recent statements by President Obama, the numbers might blow away the expected +540k jobs. As a reminder, a significant number of those jobs will be taken away in the following months (skipping one month), as the Census hiring / firing cycle is rather sharp. Still, tomorrow’s number should be the result of more than just the Census. Today’s ADP Employment Report (pdf), which excludes government jobs, showed improvement over last month (+55,000 jobs). Or it showed decelerating improvement (April was revised from +32,000 jobs to +65,000 jobs). Either way, jobs added are a good thing. Fingers are crossed.

A few months ago, and I would have been happy with today’s report. Now, I really need to see spikes in the good direction to get excited.