The US Department of Labor said on Thursday that applications decreased by 19,000 last week to record 241,000 after adjusting for the week ending October 12.
Economists polled by Reuters had expected the number of applications to reach… Unemployment benefit 260 thousand last week. Orders jumped to the highest level in more than a year the previous week due to Hurricane Helen, which devastated Florida and large swaths of the southeastern United States in late September.
There is uncertainty surrounding the labor market picture as a result of a month-long strike by about 33,000 workers at Boeing, which had consequences for the aircraft manufacturer’s supply chain and also for its non-striking workforce. Boeing was suffering from many problems before the strike carried out by its unionized workers on the West Coast. Last week, the company announced the reduction of 17,000 jobs.
The report will be issued days before the US presidential elections on November 5.
Nonfarm payrolls posted their largest rise in six months in September, with unemployment falling to 4.1 percent from 4.2 percent in August. Last month, the Federal Reserve reduced the benchmark interest rate by an exceptionally large percentage of 50 basis points to between 4.75 percent and five percent, in the first reduction in the cost of borrowing since 2020, which highlights the growing risks threatening the labor market.
The claims report showed that the number of people who received benefits after the first week of aid, an indicator of employment, rose nine thousand to 1.867 million after seasonally adjusted in the week ending October 5.
