US jobless claims filings unchanged from previous week at 213,000 as layoffs remain low

The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits remained steady last week, indicating layoffs continue to hover at historically low levels.The Labour Department reported on Thursday (March 5) that initial claims for the week ending February 28 held at 213,000, matching the previous week’s total.

Economists polled by FactSet had expected 215,000 applications. Jobless claims are widely tracked as a near real-time gauge of layoffs and overall labour market health in the US.
Last month, the Labour Department reported that US employers added a surprisingly strong 130,000 jobs in January and the unemployment rate fell to 4.3% from 4.4%.Also Read: US to hike tariffs 10-15% this week, says Scott Bessent; predicts return to Trump rates in 5 months

However, government revisions cut 2024-2025 US payrolls by hundreds of thousands, reducing the number of jobs created last year to just 181,000. That’s about one-third of the previously reported 584,000, and the weakest since the pandemic year of 2020.’

While weekly layoffs have remained in a historically low range, mostly between 200,000 and 250,000 for the past few years, a number of high-profile companies have announced job cuts recently, including UPS, Amazon, Dow and the Washington Post in recent weeks.

The Labour Department also recently reported that job openings fell in December to the lowest level in more than five years. For now, the U.S. job market appears stuck in what economists call a “low-hire, low-fire” state that has kept the unemployment rate historically low, but has left those out of work struggling to find a new job.Also Read: China ramps up ‘high stakes’ tech race with US as economic imbalances deepen

Data over the past year has broadly revealed a labour market in which hiring has clearly slowed, hobbled by uncertainty stoked by President Donald Trump’s tariffs and the lingering effects of the high interest rates the Fed engineered in 2022 and 2023 to tamp down a spike of pandemic-induced inflation.

Economists are conflicted about whether the stronger-than-expected January job gains are a one-off or possibly the first sign of a recovering labour market, which could lead the Fed to further delay more cuts to its key interest rate.

Some Fed officials have specifically argued that last year’s weak hiring shows that borrowing costs are weighing on growth and discouraging companies from expanding. A sustained pickup in hiring could undercut that theory.

The Labour Department’s report on Thursday showed that the four-week moving average of jobless claims, which smooths out some of the weekly ups and downs, fell by 4,750 to 215,750.

Also Read: US services activity expands most since 2022 on demand

The total number of Americans filing for jobless benefits for the previous week ending Feb. 21 jumped by 46,000 to 1.87 million, the government said.