Down: The number of rigs actively exploring for oil and gas in Louisiana fell by two this week to 71, according to the weekly count released today by Houston-based Baker Hughes Inc. The U.S. rig count, meanwhile, decreased by 12 to 775. Among them, 578 were exploring for oil, down from a peak of 1,609 in October 2014. As FuelFix.com reports, the oil rig count is now at its lowest since June 2010 and this is the ninth week in a row the rig count has fallen. So far in 2015, Baker Hughes has recorded only seven week-over-week increases.
On the rise: First-time claims for unemployment insurance in Louisiana for the week ending Oct. 24 increased from the previous week’s total. The state labor department statistics released today show the initial claims increased to 2,502 from the previous week’s total of 2,338. For the comparable week a year earlier, there were 2,171. Construction showed the largest over-the-week increase of 45 claims, followed by real estate and rental and leasing with 35 claims. The four-week moving average, which is a less volatile measure of claims, increased to 2,454 from the previous week’s total of 2,414. The Louisiana Workforce Commission has more details.
Testing it out: Baton Rouge is among nine pilot sites selected by the federal government for a new program designed to test new strategies to improve outcomes for low-income disconnected youths aged 14 to 24, city-parish officials have announced. The Performance Partnership Pilots for Disconnected Youth initiative is aimed at youth who are in foster care, homeless, young parents, involved in the justice system, unemployed or who have dropped out of school or are at risk of doing so. Other sites selected for the program are Broward County, Florida; Chicago; Indianapolis; Los Angeles; the entire state of Oklahoma; Seattle; seven counties in southeastern Kentucky; and Ysleta del Sur Pueblo, a Puebloan Native American tribal entity in the Ysleta section of El Paso, Texas. The city-parish has more details.
