In another sign of a cooling economy the number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits increased last week. The Labor Department reported on Thursday 6th June 2024 that initial claims for state unemployment benefits rose by 8,000 to a seasonally adjusted 229,000 for the week ended June 1st 2024. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast 220,000 claims for the week.
Unit labor costs rose less than initially estimated in the first quarter. This is another data point that suggests that the labor market is cooling. However, the cooling is not sufficient to ease the Federal Reserve's hesitation to begin cutting interest rates. This picture is unlike that in Europe where the ECB cut rates for the first time in five years. The Fed simply doesn't have that luxury at the moment.
The labor market has been steadily rebalancing toward pre-pandemic levels after the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by approximately 525 basis points since March 2022 to slow de ...
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