Trending downward: First-time claims for unemployment insurance in Louisiana for the week ending July 2 decreased from the previous week’s total, The Associated Press reports. The state labor department figures released today show the initial claims fell to 2,871 from the previous week’s total of 2,966. For the comparable week a year earlier, there were 2,707. The four-week moving average, which is a less volatile measure of claims, decreased to 3,026 from the previous week’s total of 3,206. Continued unemployment claims claimed for the week ending July 2 increased to 27,224 compared to 26,939 in the previous week.
Trending upward: For the second straight week, Louisiana gained one more rig exploring for oil and gas, while the number of rigs throughout the country rose for the fifth time in six weeks. According to weekly totals published by Houston-based Baker Hughes, Louisiana ended the week with 43 rigs exploring for oil and gas, up one from last week. This time last year, the count stood at 72. Throughout the entire U.S., there were 440 rigs operating, up nine from last week’s total of 431. Last year at this time, the count stood at 863. The U.S. rig count peaked at 4,530 in 1981 and bottomed out in May of this year at 404.
Explanation: Remember how unexpectedly bad the May U.S. employment report was? With today’s release of June employment data, it turns out the weakness was a fluke after all—and it looks like a big part of it was due to seasonal quirks related to the timing of the school year’s end, Bloomberg News reports. In May, we saw a decline in the unemployment rate and a drop in labor-force participation. The change suggested that unemployment was falling for “bad reasons,” as discouraged workers gave up looking for work. Reinforcing that notion, the share of unemployed workers leaving the labor force spiked, on a seasonally adjusted basis. The unadjusted data painted a different picture. Bloomberg has the full story.
