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New claims for unemployment benefits fell to 214,000 in the week ending 12 March, 15,000 less than the week before, the U.S. labor department reported.
The four-week moving average dropped from 231,750 to 223,000.
Continuing claims moved down from 1.49 million to 1.41 million in the most recent week tallied.
The number of open jobs in the U.S. economy was 11,263,000 as of 1 February, the labor department said, indicating that the country’s labor force permanently shrank during the COVID War.
TRENDPOST: U.S. Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell has called the country’s job market “tight to an unhealthy degree.”
But in the real declining U.S.A., some 4.3 million people quit their jobs in January, and they set a record last year with nearly 48 million people quitting their jobs. Thus, “The Great Resignation” is now standard in the new ABnormal.
TREND FORECAST: With prices rising faster than wages and the Fed still helpless to control inflation considering its low interest rate hikes, the U.S. is headed for a round of “demand destruction,” a situation in which prices are so high that consumers stop buying (see related story in this issue).
When that point is reached, demand for everything from houses to gadgets will contract dramatically and the U.S.—and, increasingly likely—the global economy, will fall into Dragflation, a Top 2022 Trend, in which prices are rising while economies are shrinking.
Demand destruction ripples through an economy, costing sales and, ultimately, jobs in America’s consumer economy.