U.S. Jobless Claims Rise Ahead of September Unemployment Report

By Matt Grossman

More Americans filed for initial jobless benefits last week, a hint of continued cooling in the labor market ahead of Friday morning's unemployment data for September.

In the week through Sept. 28, there were 225,000 initial jobless claims, compared with a revised 219,000 a week earlier. Economists polled by The Wall Street Journal had been expecting to see 220,000 initial claims.

The initial claims figure is up slightly from earlier this year, but still at a modest level historically.

The number of continued claims, a gauge of the number of people who remain out of work, fell slightly to 1.826 million in the week through Sept. 21, compared with 1.827 million the week before.

After a historic spike during the Covid-19 emergency, initial claims have returned to prepandemic levels and stayed relatively flat as the economy recovered--although the weekly figure drifted higher this summer. On average, continued claims have also inched up over the past year but remain lower than in levels that typically go with recessions.

The jobless claims data give investors a final clue about the strength of the labor market before the Department of Labor prints its report on September job creation and unemployment Friday morning. Economists in Journal's poll are expecting that payrolls expanded by 150,000 last month and that the unemployment rate held steady at 4.2%.

Economists are also watching to see whether two serious disruptions, Hurricane Helene and the East Coast port strike, throw a wrench into upcoming labor-market data. The storm hit Florida late on Sept. 26, and the port strike began Tuesday.

Write to Matt Grossman at matt.grossman@wsj.com.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

October 03, 2024 09:00 ET (13:00 GMT)

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