From 2023 through mid-year 2025, there was a distinct pattern of unresolved post-pandemic seasonality in jobless claims, which rose in the first half of the year and then declined in the second half. Beginning at the end of June last year, though, there was a “change of regime in jobless claims numbers,” probably related to the collapse of immigration and/or fear in immigrant communities, resulting in significantly lower claims on a YoY basis. In the last few weeks there have been signs that the post-pandemic seasonality may be reasserting itself, so as I wrote last week, “it will be interesting to see if the negative YoY comparisons continue, or if they fade away. If the change of regime was a one-time thing, driven mainly by immigrant worker issues, then these good YoY comparisons will fade between now and the end of July.”
To cut to the chase, the good YoY comparisons have not started to fade yet.
On a weekly basis, initial claims declined -4,000 to 226,000, while the four-week moving average rose 4,000 to 223,250. With the typical one-week delay, continuing claims rose 24,000 to 1.810 million. Here is the look since the beginning of 2023:
The close-up since the beginning of 2025 better shows how there has been a significant increase in claims in the past three weeks, to levels equivalent to those seen last July through December:
So the question is: do claims stabilize here, or start to decline again in July?
As usual, the YoY% comparison is more important for forecasting purposes, and so measured, initial claims were down -7.0%, the four-week average down -7.8%, and continuing claims down -6.5%:
These continue to be very positive signs for the economy.
We’re far enough along in the months that we can extend our comparison with the unemployment rate:
Despite the increase in jobless claims in the last few weeks, there is every reason to believe that the unemployment rate, which follows claims with a lag, will decline further in the next several months.
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