The weekly jobless claims data from the Labor Department is not getting off to the right start for June after we saw an uptick in the unemployment rate in May.  Rather than contracting, the claims grew.  On an adjusted basis, the weekly jobless claims rose by 1,000 to 427,000.  Dow Jones was actually looking for a decrease of 5,000 jobs.

The data from the week before was raised to 426,000 from 422,000.  The for-week average did actually come down by 2,750 to 424,000.

The army of unemployed measured by the continuing jobless claims does have a one-week lag but that figure fell by 71,000 to 3.676 million for the May 28 week.

The unemployment rate for workers with unemployment insurance was down to 2.9% from 3.0% in the prior week.

No incredible or special factors or exceptions were cited this week, implying that the trend just remains weak rather than any major help or anything even more ominous lurking under the surface.

These weekly claims are not going to add any credibility to a hiring wave nor to the theory of pent-up demand as far as new jobs being held back at large companies.  We have to get under 400,000 for any real improvements, and true improvements will occur only when we get close to or under 300,000 jobless claims per week.

JON C. OGG

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