Weekly Jobless Claims Modestly Decline for Week Ending June 27th

The U.S. Department of Labor is reporting that an additional 1.427 million Americans made their initial filing for unemployment benefits during the week ending on Saturday June 27th.  A decline of 55,000 from the previous week’s revised level.  It marks the thirteenth straight week of declines in initial claims since the week ending March 28th, when it hit a record peak of 6.9 million, but still remains above 1 million. The four-week moving average decreased to 1,503,750 from a revised average of 1,621,250 in the previous week. This week’s new claims brought the fourteen-week total to 48.727 million. The number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment, known as continuing claims, increased by 59,000 to a seasonally adjusted level of 19.290 million for the week ending June 20^th. Continuing claims remain below 20 million for the second week in a row. The four-week moving average was 19,854,000, a decrease of 494,500 from the previous week’s revised average. The seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate remained unchanged at 13.2% % for the week ending June 20^th. The previous week’s rate was revised down by 0.2 percentage point from 13.4% to 13.2%.