Continued claims hit a new high for the move of 1.974 million. That’s not the full story.
Today, the US Department of Labor released Unemployment Claims for the week ending August 2.
Initial Unemployment Claims
- In the week ending August 2, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 226,000, an increase of 7,000 from the previous week’s revised level. The previous week’s level was revised up by 1,000 from 218,000 to 219,000.
- The 4-week moving average was 220,750, a decrease of 500 from the previous week’s revised average. The previous week’s average was revised up by 250 from 221,000 to 221,250.
Continued Claims
- The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending July 26 was 1,974,000, an increase of 38,000 from the previous week’s revised level. This is the highest level for insured unemployment since November 6, 2021 when it was 2,041,000.
- The previous week’s level was revised down by 10,000 from 1,946,000 to 1,936,000. The 4-week moving average was 1,951,750, an increase of 5,000 from the previous week’s revised average. The previous week’s average was revised down by 2,500 from 1,949,250 to 1,946,750.
Initial Claims and 4-Week Average
Initial unemployment claims are smack in the middle of a 200K to 250K range where things have been for over three years.
However, continued claims keep rising.
This is an indication that it’s much harder to find a job once you lose one.
Continued claims bottomed in mid 2022 at 1,349,000 and are now 1,974,000.
Continued Claims, 15+ and 27+ weeks Unemployed
The huge problem with looking at continued claims alone is people expire benefits.
They are unemployed but uncounted in continued claims.
Most states offer 26 weeks unemployment, with some less. To adjust for the loss in benefits, one needs to factor in long-term employment over 26 weeks.
The monthly average of continued claims plus 27+ week unemployment is 3,778,000 through July. That’s up from a low of 2,513,000 in September of 2022.
And3.8 million is understated because not all states offer 26 weeks. Also job-hopping reduces benefits.
So look beyond the stable (for now) initial claims to see what’s really happening.
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90-day late payment delinquencies are elevated and rising.
The labor market is much weaker than most economists realize.
So fire the person that published the information and hire a new sycophant!
Ignore the falling drilling rig counts in the oil patch and the 20,000 jobs lost there. Ignore the people in the travel industry that have seen a 30+ percent drop in tourism because so many foregners refuse to travel to the US now.
Ignore the construction sites without laborers that are stalling.
Ignore the skyrocketing prices on aluminum, steel, copper, lumber and even quartzite countertops…
Ignore the cost of a cup of coffee…
Ignore? If you can…
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One thing about debt and deficit spending to stimulate the economy is that it brings forth economic activity including jobs. When the bubble burst, jobs will suffer with the economy and lowering interest rates will not help much. Lowering interest rates will however stimulate malinvestment and more government deficit spending to attempt fixing what deficit spending caused in the first place. That will ultimately prolong the healing period, but at least government will be doing something even if it is wrong headed.
Maybe it will be the Trump tariff tantrums that prick the current bubble.
No one pays attention to the Civil War back story
2 troopers shot in Pennsylvania in daylight. Governor’s going to the scene.
https://citizenwatchreport.com/120-million-square-feet-store-closings-in-the-united-states-are-on-pace-to-set-a-new-record-high-in-2025/
If everything is going to be just fine, why are thousands of stores closing all over the country? So far this year, the total amount of retail space that has been permanently closed has surpassed 120 million square feet. We have never seen anything like this before. Store closings spiked during the early days of the pandemic, but in 2025 stores are being permanently shuttered at an even faster pace. In fact, during the first six months of this year 5,822 store closures were recorded…
Uh oh, someone’s getting fired.
Really? More likely a promotion.
Failing upward is the best part of the first quarter of the 21st century.
What, me depression?
**O Furies, hear my plea!**
Let swift-winged Karma descend upon the scornful tongues
that mocked the fallen with hollow counsel—*”Learn to code!”*—
as if keystrokes could ward off the whims of cruel Fortune.
Now let them taste the bitter draught of their own words,
feel the gnawing dread of the unanswered resume,
the silent phone, the hollow echo of *”We regret to inform you…”*
For hubris ever stalks the proud,
and Nemesis remembers all.
(I’m only as good as the nearest LLM…But how would my high school English teacher know I’m cheating?)
William McGonagall, a Scottish-Irish poet, is widely considered the worst poet in history. He is known for his poor meter, monotonous rhymes, and lack of understanding of poetic techniques. Despite this, his work has gained notoriety and enduring popularity for its unintentional humor and unique style.
McGonagall’s most famous poem, “The Tay Bridge Disaster,” recounts the collapse of the Tay Rail Bridge, which actually killed 75 people, not the 90 he claimed. His poems often contained factual inaccuracies and were known for their lack of poetic devices.
Who downvoted the beginning of a fresh Greek tragedy?
Hahaha….”pearls before Schweinehund!” 😉
“fresh Greek tragedy”
Some Greek dude played slap and tickle but got caught by the hulking partner?
Is Trump’s goal of re-industrializing the US even feasible? ‘Chimerica’ evolved and huge profits went to US manufacturers over decades. That alone is a problem. Add in the debt dollars created that ‘reserve currency’ allowed.
Imagine buying massive amounts of goods and oil with dollars created but those dollars disappear into foreign reserves and you never see them again…or so you hoped.
Dollars do not “disappear” into foreign reserves. The foreign reserves consist of securities earning interest, not paper dollar bills.
They buy treasuries. That is effectively quantitative easing, I suppose the bonus is foreign buyers and not the fed. If all the dollars created needed to come home, god forbid, the inflation will be horrific. Inflation will be in play more and more anyway.
You’ve got it partly backwards again. The overseas Treasuries are earning interest, siphoning cash out of the domestic economy. That’s domestic-deflationary, overseas-inflationary.
If all the dollars “needed to come home”, the foreign holders would be selling Treasuries, driving up interest rates, driving down domestic bond prices and all other rate-sensitive asset prices (housing, stocks), and driving domestic deflation, not inflation.
If Oceania succeeds in reconfiguring “enough” of the supply chain of *weapons* from Eastasia to Oceania and mostly stops there, Oceania serfs hoping for a true industrial renaissance might feel betrayed. I do hope our Oceania oligarchs champion the serfs’ best interests or, alternatively, that the serfs lack eyes to see.
Here in the US we can solve the problem by having a day shift that tightens bolts and a night shift that loosens them.
That would employ every single citizen including the disabled and children under five.
Small bolts and nuts for tiny hands.
Uh, I’m feeling vibes of Lutnick and “Schindler’s List”. Both are uncomfortable! 😉
I feeling like I stole that from some old scifi novel.
You never took the labor test where you screwed and unscrewed bolts for a factory job?
The DEI workers that were fired are having a hard time getting employment.
I am shocked, just shocked.
Sure
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/yourmoney/article-14972513/layoffs-soar-ai-threat-jobs-losses.html
Layoffs have risen 140 percent from a year ago, a new report reveals.
Companies have already announced more than 800,000 job cuts this year alone, the highest since the pandemic upended the economy in 2020.
US-based employers cut 62,075 jobs in July compared to 25,885 in the same month last year.
The damning figures represent a 29 percent leap from the month before where 47,999 people lost their livelihood, according to a report from career advice firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Some companies — such as Procter & Gamble — have been more elusive about the reasons behind mass cuts, blaming it on restructuring, ‘automation and digitization.’
However, Challenger, Gray & Christmas analysts found that the biggest impact on job losses this year was the relentless march of AI and the knock-on effects of Trump’s tariff policies.
‘AI was cited for over 10,000 cuts last month, and tariff concerns have impacted nearly 6,000 jobs this year,’ report author and labor expert Andrew Challenger said.
Most jobs have been cut in the tech industry, where 89,251 have been cut in the first seven months of the year.
Layoffs have risen 140 percent from a year ago, a new report reveals.
Companies have already announced more than 800,000 job cuts this year alone, the highest since the pandemic upended the economy in 2020.
US-based employers cut 62,075 jobs in July compared to 25,885 in the same month last year.
The damning figures represent a 29 percent leap from the month before where 47,999 people lost their livelihood, according to a report from career advice firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Some companies — such as Procter & Gamble — have been more elusive about the reasons behind mass cuts, blaming it on restructuring, ‘automation and digitization.’
However, Challenger, Gray & Christmas analysts found that the biggest impact on job losses this year was the relentless march of AI and the knock-on effects of Trump’s tariff policies.
‘AI was cited for over 10,000 cuts last month, and tariff concerns have impacted nearly 6,000 jobs this year,’ report author and labor expert Andrew Challenger said.
Most jobs have been cut in the tech industry, where 89,251 have been cut in the first seven months of the year.
‘The industry is being reshaped by the advancement of artificial intelligence and ongoing uncertainty surrounding work visas, which have contributed to workforce reductions,’ the report stated.
Among the tech companies slashing the wage bill is Amazon where CEO Andy Jassy said he plans to reduce the company’s corporate workforce as AI will make certain roles redundant.
‘As we roll out more generative AI and agents, it should change the way our work is done,’ he told employees in an internal memo.
The company is betting big on AI recently revealing plans to splash $100 billion on data centers that the technology depends on.
It has pumped further billions into startup Anthropic, the CEO of which recently warned AI could wipe out half of all entry-level white-collar jobs.
An increasing number of Wall Street CEOs have also warned about how the rise of AI will take a sledgehammer to jobs.
‘Artificial intelligence is going to replace literally half of all white-collar workers in the US,’ Ford CEO Jim Farley said earlier this month.
Silicon Valley titan Intel also announced it would be cutting 25,000 roles in 2025, its second major round of job cuts in two years.
good post. I don’t know why anyone would down-vote it. I’m trying to be as neutral as possible, which is hard, as we’re wired to pick a team. Anecdote, I used a chat customer service tool with a large website hoster last month. I was shocked at how good it was understanding my question, asking questions, and knowing when to cut the the cord and have me talk to customer service. Whether AI or LLM, it was smart! Things may indeed get pretty crazy.
There is only one error in macroeconomics. It was perpetrated by the DIDMCA of March 31st, 1980, and the remuneration of interbank demand deposits.
You want greater R-gDp growth, then you increase the velocity of circulation and not the supply of new money. The U.S., Golden Era in Economics is the paradigm where velocity financed 2/3 of gdp.
Link: “Changes in Wealth and the Velocity of Money”
https://scispace.com/pdf/changes-in-wealth-and-the-velocity-of-money-2p2jt5sc74.pdf
“There is only one error in macroeconomics”
Yep the Mike Tyson idea that everyone has a plan until punched in the nose.
You remove the fact that banks don’t lend deposits, and you eliminate the other errors. Example
https://www.fisherinvestments.com/en-us/marketminder/fact-check-was-2013s-taper-tantrum-actually-so-tumultuou
The deceleration in LSAPs drastically increased the real rate of interest, the exchange value of the U.S. dollar, and decreased the rate of inflation. All of this was due to the increase in the supply of loan funds (due to the reduction in FDIC unlimited transaction deposit insurance), vs. increase in supply of new money.
If we start with the basics that poor people have no money then nothing will go into the bank.
I get my SS, buy canned goods from Amazon via CC, deposit the SS into the CC and never see a cent.
I watch the homeless scrounge the low income housing dumpster for whatever they can find, clothes or metal.
Even old people.
Recently I have seen old and disabled people, and one Russian woman who used her phone to translate, doing deliveries/doordash style.
One guy told me his neighbor who had been a city worker living off his pension and SS is doing deliveries too.
Strangest one was the guy that told me he frequently picks up wings from a bar about twenty miles away for delivery.
Dumbasses refuse to go to the bar, eat the wings, have a beer or whatever and if they want order more wings.
Some of those deliveries are about 50 miles round trip.
Disagree with your first comment. The number of errors in macro is legion.
Most of the assumptions in macro models are demonstrably not realistic. GDP isn’t even the right metric of economic health.
It would almost be better to say that macro itself is one giant error.
(Bonus point for those who remember all the reasons outlined by Robert F. Kennedy for why GDP isn’t a good metric, in his famous speech … and there are many more.)
Target N-gDp. There is evidence to prove that rates of change in nominal gDp can serve as a proxy figure for rates of change in all transactions.
Optimal Monetary Policy for the Masses
You’re still wrong. The simplest example is this one: Effective parenthood isn’t a “transaction” and never shows up in GDP of any kind.
And yet it’s the single most productive activity in any economy, because children successfully becoming adults are the most valuable thing any society ever produces. Everything else depends on that.
There are many, many other examples of things that show up in GDP but are net negatives for economic health.
I love the tit a tat between Wisdom Seeker and Spencer. Optimal Monetary Policy for the Masses. It’s funny, without poking fun at spencer. Great to share it! There’s something there, unmeasurable. It reminded me of a youtube piece, watching Dick Cavett interview Mick between shows at the Madison Square Garden, in 1972. Dick said people were complaining about scalpers and ticket prices. There was a brief discussion of Keynsian economics, and Mick said he didn’t agree with the school. He said there too many variables. Between shows!
The labor market is on a slow downward trajectory. The Fed should have cut 25 BP last month. Waller, Bowman & TACO were right.
Looks like we’ll blow through $37T officially next week or less than six weeks since TACO signed the BBB.
$36.930T
… which would have spooked the bond and stock markets, and done nothing else.
Except who cares when this is happening to very many people all of a sudden?
“The student loan debt crisis is exploding in 2025! In today’s deep-dive livestream, we expose the shocking truth behind a $40,922 student loan turning into a staggering $118,305 repayment nightmare. This isn’t just one story — millions of Americans are facing crippling interest rates, broken promises, and government inaction.”
That didn’t happen all of a sudden… it took many years of minimum payments and deferrals to get those people in the spot they’re in. Most of them chose to spend that money on other things.
There’s not a tradeoff between inflation and employment. The Philips curve was denigrated in the middle 60’s. Stagflation was predicted in 1961 (but not coined until 1965).
At some point the stagflation will turn into a deflationary depression.
MAGA: “Can we trust these numbers?”
It depends we are in an observer participatory universe according to Quantum physics.
Which observer opened the Cat’s box?
The Golden Age is for those with assets > 100million.
The rest of you can pound sand.
HAHAHA!
There is ALWAYS a bigger hammer.
The golden age was when royalty kept their wealth in a Scrooge McDuck vault protected by ruthless soldiers.
In the Terminator franchise, maybe that’s what the bots are really for. Carried by autonomous vehicles and coordinated by satellites — all under a single conglomerate “Skynet”.
Say…do we know anything resembling that today?
We don’t need AI… we have millions of skill-free meatheads that’ll happily abuse their countrymen for a median wage.
Cracks are beginning to appear in the “taco stagflation/recession.”
Beginning?
It’s all cracks at this point.
Continuing claims were at 1.35 million back in June 2022, when companies were literally begging and bribing people to take jobs they weren’t even qualified to fill. That says there is a floor at 1.35 million, so the effective continuing claims is at 625,000 which is just 200,000 more than at the beginning of the year despite massive job cuts over the last seven months. Somehow, this does not seem impressive to me. Well, it *is* impressive in that is sounds like a healthy labor market at full employment (just 4.2% unemployment, historically rock bottom).
can you do math? Read?
Is it just continued claims or continued claims + something else?
I believe the something else is the loss of illegal immigrants from the workforce, and you believe the something else is non-illegal workers dropping out of the workforce (ex retirements). I believe we disagree on where the *bulk* of the losses are coming from, not the contributing factors that make up the aggregate losses.
Read it and weep.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/yourmoney/article-14972513/layoffs-soar-ai-threat-jobs-losses.html
Layoffs soar 140% as the unspoken job threat gathers steam
That’s all well and good, but measured and revised numbers from the BLS paint a different picture. *Illegal* immigrants are disappearing from the workforce while both US citizens and legal immigrants are growing in the US employment numbers. I’m inclined to go with revised BLS official numbers concerning aggregates, rather than what some random article claims.
This is MAGA Math.
I have a degree in Lysenko economics from Trump University, and these numbers are designed to make Trump look bad.
All numbers lie when you are starving.
Most numbers aren’t good eating. 5’s are pretty good if you marinate them long enough, though.