Initial Jobless Claims: Dept. of Labor eliminates 1 mil filers since 12/4/10

Labor Secretary Hilda Solis once again waived her magic wand and seasonally adjusted out 146,594 first time filers of unemployment claims. Since the week ending 12/4/10, Hilda's seasonally adjusted wand (SAW) eliminated over 1 million Americans filing claims from the headline number.

January 20, 2011
Department of Labor
Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report

SEASONALLY ADJUSTED DATA

In the week ending Jan. 15, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 404,000, a decrease of 37,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 441,000. The 4-week moving average was 411,750, a decrease of 4,000 from the previous week's revised average of 415,750.

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.1 percent for the week ending Jan. 8, unchanged from the prior week's unrevised rate of 3.1 percent.

The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending Jan. 8 was 3,861,000, a decrease of 26,000 from the preceding week's revised level of 3,887,000. The 4-week moving average was 4,006,250, a decrease of 52,250 from the preceding week's revised average of 4,058,500.

UNADJUSTED DATA

The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 550,594 in the week ending Jan. 15, a decrease of 212,504 from the previous week. There were 652,327 initial claims in the comparable week in 2010.

The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.7 percent during the week ending Jan. 8, a decrease of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week. The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 4,609,826, a decrease of 167,288 from the preceding week. A year earlier, the rate was 4.5 percent and the volume was 5,791,080.

The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending Jan. 1 was 9,607,423. Complete DOL Report

States with an increase of more than 1,000

(data that will not be discussed on CNBC)

• OH   +2,523   Layoffs in the automobile industry
• IN     +5,311    Layoffs in the automobile and trade industries
• MO  +6,259    Layoffs in the transportation, warehousing, service, and manufacturing industries
• IL   +11,211    Layoffs in the construction, trade, and service industries
• WA   4,108     Layoffs in the finance, insurance, trade, and service industries.