According to an article in the Dallas Morning News, the number of job losses increased last week more than many analysts had hoped. The Labor Department employment report stated that there were more than 531,000 initial unemployment claims last week, an increase of 10,000.
The article said:
“The report is “slightly disappointing,” Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics…”
Many experts had hoped that the new job losses would lessen as a sign of recovery. But instead the previous five weeks of decreases in initial unemployment claims seems to be only a temporary reprieve from this financial crisis which as pushed the unemployment rate up to 9.8 percent.
Many of the unemployed continue to find trouble finding work in the 26 weeks originally allotted for unemployment insurance benefits prompting legislators to issue extension after extension. Currently over 8 million Americans are relying on extended unemployment benefits as the financial crisis worsens; but unfortunately 1.3 million of them will exhaust all of their benefits within a year if unemployment is not extended again.
Congress is considering adding another 14 to 20 weeks of unemployment benefits; but the extension has met with resistance in the Senate.