WASHINGTON (dpa-AFX) – The situation on the labor market in the USA has improved somewhat. The number of initial jobless claims fell by 13,000 to 224,000 last week, the Labor Department announced on Thursday in Washington. Economists had expected an average of 225,000 applications. The number of applications for aid the week before was revised upwards by 1,000 to 237,000.
The weekly initial applications are taken into account on the financial markets because they are an indicator of general developments on the market US labor market are. In general, labor market data plays an important role in monetary policy decisions made by the US Federal Reserve (Fed./jha/jsl).