US applications for jobless benefits fell last week and remain in historically healthy range
Applications for unemployment benefits for the week ending Aug. 9 fell by 3,000 to 224,000, the Labor Department reported Thursday. That's below the 230,000 new applications that economists had forecast.
Weekly applications for jobless benefits are seen as a proxy for U.S. layoffs and have mostly settled in a historically healthy range between 200,000 and 250,000 since COVID-19 throttled the economy in the spring of 2020.
Monday Mornings
The latest local business news and a lookahead to the coming week.
Thursday's report showed that the four-week average of claims, which smooths out some of the week-to-week volatility, ticked up by 750 to 221,750.
The total number of Americans collecting unemployment benefits for the previous week of Aug. 2 fell by 15,000 to 1.96 million.
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Wednesdays What's next in arts, life and pop culture. 'This is an example of where technology is sort of ahead of the regulators,' Oliver said, adding: 'As this rolls out to more of a nationwide product, we expect it will become more mainstream as people understand it better.' ___ Associated Press video journalist Mingson Lau in Baltimore contributed to this report. ___ The Associated Press' climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP's standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at
