Personal Loans

Washington, D.C., United States (AHN) – Initial jobless claims dropped to 388,000 for the week ending Dec. 25, their lowest level since July of 2008, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

However, with an unemployment rate of 9.8 percent and 15.1 million unemployed Americans, analysts say first time jobless claims need to drop to 375,000 before the unemployment rate will be significantly affected.

Investors apparently agreed that the positive jobless claims news was not sufficient because the lower number of initial unemployment benefit claims failed to move the stock markets.

First time claims came in lower than analysts expected, dropping by 34,000 from the prior weeks’ revised figure of 422,000. However, analysts warned that it is difficult to get accurate information on first time claims around the holidays and noted that the number of people who received continuing jobless benefits during the week ending Dec. 18 rose by 57,000 to a seasonally adjusted 4.13 million.

According to DOL figures, the “advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.3 percent for the week ending Dec. 18, an increase of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week’s unrevised rate of 3.2 percent.”

The total number of people in all programs receiving jobless benefits for the latest week that data is available was 8,866,924 for the week ending Dec. 4.

Extended unemployment benefits continued to be available to jobless Americans in 35 states and the District of Columbia during the week ending Dec. 11 because of continued high unemployment. Those states were Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

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