Jobless claims dip even lower

The August payrolls report showed a sharp deceleration in job growth. But the evidence is pretty clear this is not for lack of labor demand. New data from the Census shows a growing number of people are staying out of work because of virus concerns. In other words, this is a labor supply issue. #jobs #economy

Data about U.S. #jobs improved today. Fewer people lost their jobs last week and fewer people were unemployed. But that's not the whole story. Why? Let's talk about the good news. The number of people who lost their jobs last week fell to 310,000 from a revised 345,000 in the week before. This is a good change! But it's still not as good as things were before #COVID19. How so? The number of people who lost their jobs last week is still over 46% higher than before COVID. Jobs data show that in the first 10 weeks of 2020, 212,000 people lost their jobs on average every week. What else did the report show? There was a drop in the number of people continuing to collect unemployment because they were out of #work. There was also a drop in the number of total unadjusted jobless claims in all programs. But it's still a big numberat over 11.9 million. What does this mean? Total jobless claims are still high. And they imply an unemployment rate around 7.4%. So, what's the big takeaway? Things are moving in the right direction for Americans #OpenToWork. But the COVID Delta variant still presents risks. Plus, a full recovery for all parts of the labor market will take time, even if the #economy and equity #markets reflect strength.

The U.S. economy "downshifted slightly" in August as concerns grew over how the renewed surge of coronavirus cases would affect the economic rebound, the Federal Reserve said on Wednesday in its latest Beige Book. Separately, however, Labor Department data showed that open jobs hit yet another series record, with workers quitting their jobs en masse, and nearly 11 million positions unfilled. On Thursday, jobless claims, which last week set a new pandemic-era low, will give markets more grist for the mill.