By IANS,
Washington : The number of people in US initially applying for unemployment aid last week has hit the lowest level in seven months, a positive sign for the labour market, official figures showed Thursday.
The US Labor Department said that the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims for jobless benefits was 390,000 in the week ending Nov 5, a decrease of 10,000 from the previous week’s revised figure, Xinhua reported.
The latest figure is the lowest level since April, signaling the US labour market is slowly recovering.
Fewer than 425,000 people applying for aid is consistent with modest job growth, but the number of jobless claims will have to fall to 375,000 or below to signal a sustained drop in the unemployment rate.
Meanwhile, the four-week moving average, which is a more closely watched claims figure, dipped by 5,250 to 400,000. This is also the lowest since April.
The US unemployment rate edged down to 9 percent from 9.1 percent in October. However, no one believes that the job market will turn to normal levels in the short term, as the US economy added only 80,000 net jobs in October, the fewest in four months.
The US economy grew only 0.9 percent in the first half of this year before rising 2.5 percent in the third quarter. The market held that the growth rate in the fourth quarter would be around 2.5 and 3 percent, a pace not fast enough to bring down the high unemployment rate.