{"id":395,"date":"2025-05-01T12:46:34","date_gmt":"2025-05-01T12:46:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/?p=395"},"modified":"2025-05-03T23:40:47","modified_gmt":"2025-05-03T23:40:47","slug":"the-number-of-americans-filing-for-jobless-claims-jumps-last-week-but-remains-at-healthy-levels","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/2025\/05\/01\/the-number-of-americans-filing-for-jobless-claims-jumps-last-week-but-remains-at-healthy-levels\/","title":{"rendered":"The number of Americans filing for jobless claims jumps last week, but remains at healthy levels"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>By MATT OTT, Associated Press Business Writer<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>U.S. applications for jobless benefits jumped to their highest level in two months, but layoffs remain in a historically healthy range despite increasing fears of a tariff-induced economic slowdown.<\/p>\n<p>Jobless claim applications jumped by 18,000 to 241,000 for the week ending April 26, the Labor Department said Thursday. That\u2019s more than the 225,000 new applications analysts forecast and the most since late February.<\/p>\n<p>Weekly applications for jobless benefits are considered a proxy for layoffs, and have mostly stayed in a healthy range between 200,000 and 250,000 for the past few years.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"related left\">\n<h2 class=\"widget-title\" data-curated-ids=\"\" data-relation-type=\"automatic-primary-tag\">Related Articles<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p>\t\t\t<a class=\"article-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/2025\/05\/02\/mark-zuckerberg-funding-affordable-housing\/\" title=\"Mark Zuckerberg\u2019s charity quietly cuts funding for affordable housing, homelessness groups\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"dfm-title metered\"><br \/>\n\t\t\tMark Zuckerberg\u2019s charity quietly cuts funding for affordable housing, homelessness groups\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>\t\t\t<a class=\"article-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/2025\/05\/02\/yellowstone-fatal-crash-tour-group\/\" title=\"7 people are dead after a truck and tour van collided near Yellowstone, police say\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"dfm-title metered\"><br \/>\n\t\t\t7 people are dead after a truck and tour van collided near Yellowstone, police say\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>\t\t\t<a class=\"article-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/2025\/05\/02\/head-start-research-cuts\/\" title=\"Email mistake reveals secret plans to end research on Head Start and other child safety net programs\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"dfm-title metered\"><br \/>\n\t\t\tEmail mistake reveals secret plans to end research on Head Start and other child safety net programs\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>\t\t\t<a class=\"article-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/2025\/05\/02\/trump-media-pbs-npr\/\" title=\"PBS chief slams Trump\u2019s executive order aiming to cut federal funding for PBS and NPR as unlawful\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"dfm-title metered\"><br \/>\n\t\t\tPBS chief slams Trump\u2019s executive order aiming to cut federal funding for PBS and NPR as unlawful\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p>\t\t\t<a class=\"article-title\" href=\"https:\/\/www.denverpost.com\/2025\/05\/02\/flu-deaths-kids\/\" title=\"CDC reports 216 child deaths this flu season, the most in 15 years\"><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<span class=\"dfm-title metered\"><br \/>\n\t\t\tCDC reports 216 child deaths this flu season, the most in 15 years\t\t<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/aside>\n<p>The total number of Americans receiving unemployment benefits for the week of April 19 climbed to 1.92 million, the most since November of 2021.<\/p>\n<p>Even though President Donald Trump has\u00a0paused\u00a0or pulled back on many of his tariff threats, concerns remain about a global economic slowdown that could upend what has been an historically resilient labor market.<\/p>\n<p>According to the Commerce Department, contraction\u00a0has already begun in the U.S.<\/p>\n<p>Commerce reported Wednesday that the U.S. economy shrank at a 0.3% annual pace from January through March as Trump\u2019s trade wars disrupted business. First-quarter growth was slowed by a surge in imports as companies in the United States tried to bring in foreign goods before Trump\u00a0imposed massive tariffs.<\/p>\n<p>It was the first quarterly GDP decline in three years.<\/p>\n<p>Like his pledge to institute tariffs, Trump\u2019s promise to drastically downsize the federal government workforce has occupied much of the early weeks of his presidency and is still in motion.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not clear when the job cuts ordered by the Department of Government Efficiency \u2014 or \u201cDOGE,\u201d spearheaded by Elon Musk \u2014 will surface in the weekly layoffs data. However, the federal government staff reductions\u00a0are already being felt, even outside of the Washington, D.C. area.<\/p>\n<p>Federal agencies that have either announced layoffs or are planning cuts include the\u00a0Department of Health and Human Services,\u00a0IRS,\u00a0Small Business Administration,\u00a0Veterans Affairs\u00a0and\u00a0Department of Education.<\/p>\n<p>Despite showing some signs of weakening during the past year, the labor market remains healthy with plenty of job openings and relatively few layoffs.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this month, the government reported that U.S. employers added a\u00a0surprisingly strong 228,000 jobs\u00a0in March. While the unemployment rate inched up to 4.2%, that\u2019s still a healthy figure by historical standards.<\/p>\n<p>The Labor Department issues its April jobs report on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>Some high-profile companies have announced job cuts already this year, including\u00a0Workday,\u00a0Dow,\u00a0CNN,\u00a0Starbucks,\u00a0Southwest Airlines\u00a0and Facebook parent company Meta.<\/p>\n<p>The Labor Department also reported Thursday that the four-week average of applications, which softens some of the week-to-week volatility, rose by 5,500 to 226,000.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By MATT OTT, Associated Press Business Writer U.S. applications for jobless benefits jumped to their highest level in two months, but layoffs remain in a historically healthy range despite increasing fears of a tariff-induced economic slowdown. Jobless claim applications jumped by 18,000 to 241,000 for the week ending April 26, the Labor Department said Thursday.&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":109,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[10],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":396,"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395\/revisions\/396"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.soapandseife.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}