The Labor Department announced on Sept. 9 that the number of American workers who filed for unemployment last week hit a new pandemic-era low, giving an immediate upward jolt to risk assets such as stocks and cryptocurrencies, followed by pullbacks as investors mulled mixed signals around the state of the economy.
First-time filings for unemployment insurance—a proxy for layoffs—came in at 310,000 for the week ending Sept. 4, a drop of 35,000 from the previous week’s revised level of 345,000, the Labor Department said in a statement (pdf). This is the lowest weekly claims figure since March 14, 2020, when 256,000 people filed for unemployment.
