Thursday, February 16, 2012

U.S. Jobless Claims Are Lowest Since 2008

The number of people seeking unemployment benefits fell to the lowest point in almost four years last week, the latest signal that the job market is steadily improving.

In other economic news, a rise in building permits suggested that the construction industry was growing confident that more buyers were ready to come off the sidelines, and the latest data on wholesale prices signaled that inflation remained largely in check.
Read the rest here.

3 comments:

Michael said...

Hi, John;

I think you need to be skeptical about the statistics that the Feds publish. They have been massaging the CPI for years. As for unemployment, people who have dropped off of unemployment benefits and have given up looking for work are not counted as "unemployed." So I think these numbers are dodgy.

A good site to use as a cross-check is John Williams' Shadow Government Statistics:

http://www.shadowstats.com/

I think that site will help you get a more complete picture of what is happening.

LV said...

I am not counted anywhere as "unemployed" because I exhausted my benefits and am now drawing Social Security. Officially, I'm "retired" but in real life I'm unemployed. And uninsured.

John (Ad Orientem) said...

Michael
I am well aware of the games the Feds play with statistics and ShadowStats has been linked in the side bar of the blog for a few years. It's an awesome site.