Washington, DC, November 23, 2005--Initial claims for state unemployment insurance rose 32,000, reaching 335,000, their highest level in a month in the week ended Nov. 19, the Labor Department said Wednesday.
The number of initial claims outpaced economists' expectations. Analysts surveyed by MarketWatch had been predicting that claims would rise to 310,000 in the latest week.
The Labor Department's four-week moving average rose to 323,250, up by 1,250 from the previous week's revised average of 322,000.
There were 10,000 claims related to Hurricane Rita and Hurricane Katrina in the latest week, a Labor spokesman said. The cumulative total of Rita- and Katrina-related claims is now 555,000, he said.
There were 11,000 claims related to Hurricane Wilma, meanwhile, in the week ended Nov. 19. There have been 27,400 claims filed by victims of that storm.
Claims for the week ended Nov. 12 were revised slightly upward, to 305,000. Read the report.
The seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate stood unchanged at 2.2% for the Nov. 12 week.
Continuing claims, meanwhile, rose to 2.8 million, up by 59,000 from the prior week. It was the highest since Oct. 15.
The four-week moving average of continuing claims fell to 2.79 million, the lowest since Oct. 1.
A year ago, initial claims were slightly lower at 324,000.
