If unemployment application statistics are any indication, U.S. companies are hanging onto their workers.
Fewer Americans sought unemployment assistance last week as applications for unemployment benefits for the week ending Aug. 23 fell to 229,000, according to statistics released Thursday by the Labor Department. That’s 5,000 fewer than the previous week.
Weekly applications for jobless benefits are seen as a proxy for layoffs and have mostly stayed between 200,000 and 250,000 since the U.S. started to recover from the Covid pandemic a few years ago.
The national unemployment rate remains low at 4.2%.
Sluggishness in the job market is a key reason that Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell signaled last week that the central bank may cut its key interest rate at its next meeting Sept. 16-17.
The Labor Department’s report also showed that the four-week average of claims, which softens some of the week-to-week swings, rose by 2,500 to 228,500.
The total number of Americans collecting unemployment benefits for the week of Aug. 16 fell to 1.95 million. That’s down 7,000 from nearly a four-year high reached earlier this month.
