U.S. Jobless Claims Fall to Lowest Levels Since 2008

The Labor Department announced that new unemployment claims have dropped to lowest levels since July 2008.
U.S. Jobless Claims Fall to Lowest Levels Since 2008
People wait in line at a job fair in New York City. New unemployment claims have dropped to their lowest levels since July 2008 (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
12/31/2009
Updated:
10/1/2015
<a><img src="https://www.theepochtimes.com/assets/uploads/2015/09/jobs92859536.jpg" alt="People wait in line at a job fair in New York City. New unemployment claims have dropped to their lowest levels since July 2008 (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)" title="People wait in line at a job fair in New York City. New unemployment claims have dropped to their lowest levels since July 2008 (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)" width="320" class="size-medium wp-image-1824340"/></a>
People wait in line at a job fair in New York City. New unemployment claims have dropped to their lowest levels since July 2008 (Spencer Platt/Getty Images)
NEW YORK—The Labor Department announced on Thursday that new unemployment claims have dropped to their lowest levels since July 2008, before the fall of Lehman Brothers and the ensuing global financial crisis.

New jobless claims decreased 22,000 to a seasonally adjusted 432,000 last week, a better result than economists forecasted. Although the U.S. economy is officially out of the recession, the job market is expected to lag far behind in recovery.

Initial jobless claims are a key barometer for economists and investors to gage the health of the U.S. economy. During boom times, jobless claims average around 300,000 per week, and earlier this year, new unemployment filings jumped to more than 600,000 filings each week.

“What we’ve seen is definite stability and just a hint toward things trying to get better,” Jeffrey Joerres, CEO of Manpower Inc., said in a Bloomberg television interview on Thursday.

But the ranks of the unemployed remain high. More than 15 million Americans are still unemployed, and millions more have stopped actively searching for work. The U.S. Labor Department said there were 108.5 million private-sector non-farm jobs in the country as of the end of November, or 1.5 million more than the beginning of the decade.

Twenty-six states reported drops in unemployment claims. One notable exception was Michigan, which reported 8,382 more unemployed workers, which was due to the layoffs in the automotive industry. California and Florida also saw increases. Tennessee, Illinois, and Pennsylvania saw the largest decreases.