WASHINGTON - Initial jobless claims dropped 24,000 to 398,000, on a seasonally adjusted basis, in the week ended July 23, the Labor Department reported Thursday. That was the lowest number since 385,000 initial claims were reported in the week ended April 2.
Continuing claims for the week ending July 16 dipped to 3.703 million.
Economists expected 415,000 initial jobless claims and 3.700 million continuing claims, according to the median estimate from Thomson Reuters.
Initial claims for the July 16 week were revised down to 422,000. The continuing claims figure for the previous week was revised down to 3.720 million.
The four-week moving average of initial claims for the July 23 week, a less volatile figure was, 413,750, after 422,250 the prior week. The four-week average for continuing claims in the July 16 week was 3.721 million, down from 3.726 million the week before.
Wrightson ICAP said before the report that "initial jobless claims may remain noisy in the weeks ahead, so we will continue to take the data with a grain of salt." Seasonal adjustment problems are common at this time of the year. A Labor Department official said the seasonal adjustment process produced a lower initial claims number in this report.
There was no longer a special factor from the Minnesota government shutdown, which ended in the middle of the July 23 week.
There were 33 states with lower initial claims and 20 with increased claims.
