WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. jobless claims rose to 211,000 in the week to March 4, the Labor Department said on Thursday, but underlying trends suggest the labor market remains tight.
Economists polled by Reuters forecast an average of 195,000 registrations last week.
Those of the previous week were confirmed at 190,000.
Claims had remained below the 200,000 threshold for seven weeks in a row, indicating that tech job cuts have not had a significant impact on the labor market.
Data released on Wednesday showed there were 1.9 job openings for every unemployed person in January. In its “Beige Book” on the state of the economy in the United States published on Wednesday, the Fed judged the job market to be “solid” in February, also pointing out that “finding workers with the skills or experience desired remained difficult”. The four-week rolling average of registrations, which better reflects underlying developments by mitigating weekly volatility, rose to 197,000 from 193,000 the previous week. The number of people regularly receiving benefits rose to 1,718 during the week of February 25 (last week for which these figures are available) against 1,649 the previous week.
(Lucia Mutikani, Laetitia Volga, edited by Blandine Hénault)
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