Weekly Jobless Claims Climb Back Over 1 Million in the Week Ending August 15th, 2020

The U.S. Department of Labor is reporting that an additional 1,106,000 Americans made their initial filing for unemployment benefits during the week ending on Saturday, August 15th. An increase of 135,000 from the previous week’s revised level. Still well below the peak of 6.9 million which dates back to the week ending March 28th. Claims are once again back over 1 million, where they have been for the past 19 of 20 weeks. After dropping below that threshold last week. The 4-week moving average was 1,175,750, a decrease of 79,000 from the previous week’s revised average. This week’s new claims brought the twenty-one-week total to 57.450 million. The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment, known as continuing claims during the week ending 8th August was 14,844,000, a decrease of 636,000 from the previous week’s revised level. Continuing claims remain below 20 million for the sixth week in a row. The 4-week moving average was 15,841,250 a decrease of 326,750 from the previous week’s revised average. The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 10.2% for the week ending 8th August, a decrease of 0.4 % point from the previous week’s unrevised rate.