The number of new unemployment insurance claims edged down last week to 236,000. This brought the four-week average to 245,000, just over 4.0 percent higher than the year-ago level. However, the number of continuing claims rose by 37,000 to 1,974,000, which is 7.0 percent above the year-ago level.

These are not frightening numbers in the sense that they don’t show a labor market falling off a cliff, as we often see at the start of a recession. But they do show a labor market that is gradually weakening.

What we are seeing is a situation where layoffs are occurring at a relatively moderate pace, but workers who lose their jobs are having difficulty finding new ones. This is consistent with the data from the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, which show a modest falloff in job openings and hires, as well as a decline in the percentage of workers voluntarily quitting their jobs.

This........

© CounterPunch