Inching downward: First-time claims for unemployment insurance in Louisiana for the week ending July 30 decreased from the previous week’s total, The Associated Press reports. The state labor department figures released today show initial claims fell to 2,712 from the previous week’s total of 2,880. For the comparable week a year earlier, there were 2,479. The four-week moving average, a less volatile measure of claims, decreased to 2,954 from the previous week’s total of 2,994. Continued unemployment claims claimed for the week ending July 30 increased to 27,766 compared to 27,743 in the previous week. The four-week moving average for such claims increased to 27,568 from the previous week’s average of 27,432.
Back to reality: After a gain last week, Louisiana’s count of active oil and gas rigs dropped by four this week, according to Houston-based oilfield services company Baker Hughes. Louisiana had a total of 42 active rigs this week, compared to 46 last week. Of those 42, 15 operated in north Louisiana, seven were on land in south Louisiana, four were inland on water in the southern part of the state, and 16 were offshore. Nationwide, the total count increased by a sole rig, from 463 to 464. Around roughly the same time last year, Louisiana had 82 active rigs, while the U.S. had 884. The nation’s rig count has plummeted over the last two years amid collapsing oil prices.
Inner strength: For years, economists and urban experts have talked about the doughnut hole of decay in city centers. But increasingly, as The Wall Street Journal reports, many urban cores are becoming islands of economic strength surrounded by decay that reaches out into inner-ring suburbs—beyond which fortunes rise again in more distant suburbs. Polarization has increased within other U.S. cities, where a turnaround for city centers has been accompanied by economic decline or stagnation in many longtime middle-class enclaves and lower-income neighborhoods with high minority populations, according to a census data analysis by The Wall Street Journal. Read the full story.
