The number of new claims for unemployment benefits remained near a historical low last week, indicating few Americans are losing their jobs to layoffs.
The Department of Labor said on Thursday that 199,000 people filed for benefits for the first time, up from 198,000 in the prior week. That was better than the 201,000 consensus forecast.
Jobless claims have been below 200,000 for three consecutive weeks, the first such streak in 57 years. The last time jobless claims remained this low for this long was in 1969, during the extraordinary stretch of low unemployment from 1967 through 1969. The current numbers are all the more extraordinary because the workforce is...
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