{"id":19480,"date":"2014-07-18T14:15:16","date_gmt":"2014-07-18T06:15:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=19480"},"modified":"2014-07-18T12:50:22","modified_gmt":"2014-07-18T04:50:22","slug":"applications-for-us-jobless-benefits-fall-to-302000-4-week-average-lowest-since-june-2007","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2014\/07\/18\/applications-for-us-jobless-benefits-fall-to-302000-4-week-average-lowest-since-june-2007\/","title":{"rendered":"Applications for US jobless benefits fall to 302,000; 4 week average lowest since June 2007"},"content":{"rendered":"

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WASHINGTON\u2014The number of people seeking U.S. unemployment benefits fell last week, a steady decline that suggests a strengthening job market.<\/p>\n

Weekly applications for unemployment aid dipped 3,000 to a seasonally adjusted 302,000, the Labor Department said Thursday.<\/p>\n

The four-week average, a less volatile measure, dropped 3,000 to 309,000, the lowest level since June 2007, about five months before the start of the Great Recession.<\/p>\n

Applications are a proxy for layoffs, a sign that they expect economic growth to continue. When businesses are confident enough to keep staff, they are also likely to hire more people.<\/p>\n

Hiring is at its healthiest clip since the late 1990s and the 6.1 per cent unemployment rate is at a 5 1\/2-year low. Employers added 288,000 jobs in June, the fifth straight month of job gains above 200,000.<\/p>\n

The latest report on unemployment benefits \u201csuggests another solid payroll report\u201d with job additions in July, said Jennifer Lee, a senior economist at BMO Capital Markets.<\/p>\n

Still, the steady hiring gains have yet to boost wages significantly. Wage growth has barely matched inflation since the recession ended five years ago.<\/p>\n

But more people with jobs increases the total number of paychecks, which could boost consumer spending and growth. After a sharp contraction in the economy in the first three months of the year, most economists expect growth to return in the April-June quarter and exceed 3 per cent at an annual pace in the second half of 2014.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON\u2014The number of people seeking U.S. unemployment benefits fell last week, a steady decline that suggests a strengthening job market. …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":19481,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19480","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","mauthors-josh-boak","mauthors-the-associated-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19480","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19480"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19480\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19481"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}