Weekly Jobless Claims Fall

The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment aid fell last week to nearly its lowest level in four and a half years, the Labor Department said Thursday.

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits dropped 12,000 to a seasonally adjusted 350,000, the government said. The previous week’s figure was revised to show 1,000 more applications than previously reported.

After a spike in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, which ravaged the East Coast in late October, the weekly levels of new claims have now dropped to their lowest levels since the early days of the 2007-9 recession. The four-week moving average fell 11,250 last week to 356,750, the lowest since March 2008.

That suggests the surge in layoffs since the recession may have run its course, although companies still are adding to their payrolls at a lackluster pace.

The report included a caveat for the latest week. President Obama declared Monday a holiday for federal workers, and many state offices followed suit and were unable to provide complete data for last week’s jobless claims. Data for 19 states was estimated, a Labor Department official said. Fourteen of those states submitted their own estimates, which tend to be fairly accurate because the state officials work with a significant amount of data, the official said.

Separately, the Commerce Department said new single-family home sales accelerated in November to the fastest pace in two and a half years, and the median sales price jumped from the same month in 2011, two signs that the housing recovery was gaining some steam.

Sales climbed 4.4 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted 377,000-unit annual rate, the government said. That was in line with analysts’ forecasts of a 378,000-unit annual pace.

But government data for new-home sales are subject to substantial revisions. Indeed, the Commerce Department cut its estimate for sales in October by 7,000 to a 361,000-unit rate.

The annual sales pace for November was the quickest since April 2010.

The median price of a new home rose to $246,200, up 14.9 percent from the same month in 2011.

New-home building is expected to add to economic growth this year for the first time since 2005. The housing sector, however, remains a shadow of its former self.

The pace of new-home sales is roughly a quarter of the high clocked in July 2005 when the housing bubble was still inflating. Shortly thereafter, the bubble began to deflate, helping trigger the 2007-9 recession, which was the deepest downturn since the Great Depression.

Article source: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/28/business/economy/weekly-jobless-claims-fall.html?partner=rss&emc=rss