The slowing momentum in the economy was underscored by other data from the Labor Department on Thursday showing producer prices falling by the most in nearly three years in March, with sticky services inflation subsiding. Still, the labor market and inflation are likely not cooling fast enough to stop the Federal Reserve from raising interest rates one more time next month.
Unadjusted claims increased 27,457 to 234,577 last week, with filings in California surging 11,388. There were also significant gains in claims in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Texas, New York and Connecticut. That offset a notable decline in Ohio. The claims report showed the number of people receiving benefits after an initial week of aid, a proxy for hiring, dropped 13,000 to 1.810 million during the week ending April 1, not too far from pre-pandemic record low levels.
"We expect the health of the labor market to deteriorate at a gradual pace in the second quarter but then weaken more quickly in the second half as the economy suffers a mild recession," said Oren Klachkin, lead U.S. economist at Oxford Economics in New York. "The upcoming labor market downturn will be modest since the drop in demand is expected to be fairly modest."
In a separate report on Thursday, the Labor Department said its producer price index for final demand dropped 0.5% in March, the most since April 2020, after being unchanged in February. Prices for services fell 0.3%, the largest decline since April 2020. There was a 0.9% drop in margins for trade services. The cost of transportation and warehousing services fell 1.3%.
chenweihua When does China release its jobless numbers?
Oh really? I was told this is th best economy ever.
I’m guessing Wall Street likes this. Labor is expensive. Plus the Fed might ease up on rate hikes.
So we’re in a recession but just don’t know it yet.
What happened to the migrants stealing our job?