Headline Roundup • November 19th, 2020
U.S. Jobless Claims Rise Amid Third Quarter Economic Growth
Summary from the AllSides News Team
Featured Coverage of this Story
New York Times (News)
New claims for unemployment insurance remained elevated last week amid a surge in coronavirus cases, the government reported Thursday.
More than 743,000 workers filed new claims for state benefits last week, before adjusting for seasonal factors, an increase of 18,000 from the week before. With seasonal swings factored in, the latest figure was 742,000, also an increase from the previous week, the Labor Department said.
The economy grew at a record pace during the third quarter as it rebounds from the coronavirus pandemic, although it has not fully recovered to its pre-pandemic heights.
GDP increased by an annualized rate of 33.1 percent during the third quarter, a stark contrast to the second quarter’s annualized rate of 31.4 percent contraction, the Commerce Department reported Thursday. The figure is a measure of how much the economy would have grown if the third quarter rate had endured for a whole year.
The number of applications for unemployment benefits rose sharply last week, indicating continued challenges for the U.S. economic recovery as coronavirus infections increased around the country.
Initial claims for jobless benefits, a proxy for layoffs, rose to a seasonally adjusted 742,000 last week, up from the 711,000 filed a week earlier. That level is more than three times higher than the roughly 210,000 typically filed each week in the first two months of 2020, though it is down sharply from a peak of nearly seven million in late March.
AllSides Picks
More News about Economy and Jobs on AllSides
News from the Left
News from the Center
News from the Right
Fox Business
