Debt Free News

Unemployment rates slightly rise

December 18, 2006

It is being reported today that the number of people in this country seeking unemployment compensation has risen. While the increase is not a large increase, the numbers are showing that many employees are finding themselves without jobs during the holidays.

Even so, the amount of applicants that have recently filed unemployment is on par with the job market, which is said to be holding up. The job market may be seeing these increases due to a slowing overall US economy. Even Japan is reporting a lull in their economy, which is rated as the second highest economy to the US in the entire world.

All in all, even though we see a slower economy and slower housing market, more people signing up for unemployment compensation, our overall economy is said to be just fine, not excelling however.
In the next day or so, it is being reported that the Labor Department will be releasing a report that some 317,000 newly unemployed US workers applied for unemployment just  last week. This is a higher number than reported from the first week of December, which was nearly 316,000. However, when we learned about this upcoming report (and if it does show the expected amount we stated above) we will be happy since the estimated number was supposed to be about 800,000 people filing for unemployment coverage. So, even though the number of US citizens applying for out of work financial aid is up, it is not as high as expected.
As we also mentioned above, the housing market has remained in a lull, the first in five years after a record setting decade, but there are signs all over the news regarding a bettered housing market to come. It is also being reported that in the early part of this Holiday Season of spending, consumers are holding back. We will see if this remains during the last minute shopping push right before the 25^th.

However, even though we have seen these lulls in the major economical departments here in the US, many employers are not in any rush to hand out the pink slips. Maybe they will after the holidays – we will be watching.
The month long average for unemployment filings has slowed since last week, which reflects the lowest increase in almost 2 months. Still, it will be interesting to see what happens to these numbers after the beginning of the New Year.

In the US, the rate of unemployment was hovering at 4.5% last month. This rate is 0.1% higher than that month last year.

We have seen cutbacks in the housing construction field as thousands of construction workers were out of jobs due to the housing industry hit. Even auto plant workers lost jobs and auto prices have slid to drum up consumer spending on new cars. In fact, builders have seen cut backs since July.
Our overall US economy slid about two percent in the last quarter of this year so far. Again, housing has a lot to do with it. Look for many news programs and economist to be discussing these very issues in the weeks to come for sure.

As far as we know about the upcoming federal report that will be out in a day or so, it is being said that Kentucky has seen the most unemployment. Kentucky is a main auto plant state as well as manufacturer of plastic and rubber. There are just under 40 US states that are reporting a decline in unemployment applications however. It looks as though the Middle American and blue collar industry has taken the biggest hits.  

Even the great state of California has reported an increase in unemployment claims. The giant state has many industries and it will be interesting to see what the upcoming report details about where these claims are coming from exactly.

One thing we can report is that Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio are in good shape as far as the employment rate is concerned.

(673)