U.S. applications for jobless aid decreased slightly last week, continuing a trend of historically low layoff numbers. The Labor Department reported Thursday that the number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits in the week ending June 27 fell by 1,000 to 215,000.
This figure was lower than the 225,000 new applications projected by analysts surveyed by FactSet. Weekly jobless claims are widely viewed as a real-time indicator of the health of the U.S. job market.
The four-week moving average for jobless claims, designed to smooth out weekly fluctuations, also declined by 2,500 to 222,000. For the previous week ending June 20, the total number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits saw a modest increase of 2,000, reaching 1.81 million.