Weekly Unemployment Rate Increases According to DOL

Weekly unemployment insurance claims increased by 4,000 to 308,000 according to statistics released by the Department of Labor Thursday.

The advance weekly figure for the seasonally adjusted four week moving average was 313,250, a decrease of 750 from the previous week’s revised average of 314,000.

The advance number of actual claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 307,123 in the week ending Oct. 7. This is an increase of 57,887 from the previous week. There were 380,093 initial claims for the same time frame in 2005.

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 1.9 percent for the week ending Sept. 30, unchanged from the prior week's unrevised rate of 1.9 percent.

The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for the week ending September 30 increased by 5,000 from the previous week’s revised level of 2,440,000. The four-week moving average was 2,442,500, a decrease of 11,250 from the preceding week’s average of 2,453,750.