Fewer Workers File First-Time Unemployment Claims

In a week when the Federal Reserve kept its interest rates steady due to a job market they called “solid,” the number of Americans filing for jobless benefits fell last week.

Applications for unemployment benefits fell to 207,000 for the week ending Jan. 25, according to statistics released by the Labor Department Thursday. That’s  drop of 16,000 in a week when analysts were expecting 225,000 new applications.

The four-average, which evens out some of the weekly volatility, ticked down by 1,000 to 212,500. The total number of Americans receiving unemployment benefits for the week of Jan. 18 fell by 42,000 to 1.86 million. That’s after it had risen to 1.9 million the previous week, the highest total since November 2021.

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Brad Kadrich
Brad Kadrich is an award-winning journalist with more than 30 years’ experience, most recently as an editor/content coach for the Observer & Eccentric Newspapers and Hometown Life, managing 10 newspapers in Wayne and Oakland counties. He was born in Detroit, grew up in Warren and spent 15 years in the U.S. Air Force, primarily producing base newspapers and running media and community relations operations.