Weekly Jobless Claims Increase in the Week Ending January 8, 2022

The U.S. Department of Labor is reporting that an additional 230,000 Americans made their initial filing for unemployment benefits during the week ending on Saturday, January 8, 2022. This is an increase of 23,000 from the previous week’s unrevised level. The 4-week moving average was 210,750 — an increase of 6,250 from the previous week’s unrevised average.

The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment (known as continuing claims) during the week ending January 1, 2022 was 1,559,000 — a decrease of 194,000 from the previous week’s revised level. This is the lowest level for insured unemployment since June 2, 1973, when it was 1,556,000. The 4-week moving average was 1,721,500 — a decrease of 77,000 from the previous week’s revised average. This is the lowest level for this average since March 7, 2020, when it was 1,714,500.

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 1.1% for the week ending January 1, 2022, a decrease of 0.2 percentage points from the previous week’s unrevised rate.