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The number of U.S. workers filing new claims for unemployment benefits sank to 348,000 in the most recent reporting week, the U.S. labor department announced.
The figure, the fourth consecutive weekly decline and the lowest since 14 March, 2020, beat the 363,000 forecast by economists that Bloomberg had surveyed.
Continuing claims numbered 2.82 million, barely above the 2.8 million the Bloomberg group had predicted.
TREND FORECAST: Unemployment is easing but is unlikely to return to pre-crisis levels for the foreseeable future.
The jobless rate will tick-up again as businesses and politicians impose new passport restrictions that will in turn push economies down.
However, the job market’s stubbornness will be due only partly to the virus. Jobs also are at risk because of ways in which the COVID War has realigned segments of the economy: eliminating jobs in retail and hospitality, for example, while emphasizing jobs in manufacturing, finance, and other sophisticated fields requiring skills too few workers now have.