The stabilizing forces in the jobs market apparently hit a snag last week. This week’s Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report indicates a bit more trouble than anticipated. New claims rose to 460k. Last week’s number was revised up 3,000 to 442k. This was higher than the Bloomberg consensus range of 435k to 450k. From the report:

In the week ending April 3, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 460,000, an increase of 18,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 442,000. The 4-week moving average was 450,250, an increase of 2,250 from the previous week’s revised average of 448,000…

The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.5 percent for the week ending March 27, a decrease of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week’s unrevised rate of 3.6 percent.

The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending March 27 was 4,550,000, a decrease of 131,000 from the preceding week’s revised level of 4,681,000. The 4-week moving average was 4,648,250, a decrease of 36,000 from the preceding week’s revised average of 4,684,250.

No good news here. The unadjusted numbers aren’t any better:

The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 414,657 in the week ending April 3, an increase of 6,492 from the previous week. There were 623,279 initial claims in the comparable week in 2009.

The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.9 percent during the week ending March 27, a decrease of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week. The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 5,027,944, a decrease of 168,431 from the preceding week. A year earlier, the rate was 4.8 percent and the volume was 6,451,690.

There doesn’t seem to be any single thing to pin this on. Stability just isn’t improving.

The good / bad lists confirm our previous optimism (remember, this data lags an extra week):

The good list (-1000 or more): MI, IL, OK, MO

The bad list (+1000 or more): CA, NJ, OR, TX

TX (the worst) was +3,640 vs MI (the best) at -2,240. The auto industry looks a little better while the finance industry looks a little worse. Every other industry mentioned in one list was matched in the other list. The net effect was a few jobs moving across state lines.

In other news, Congress is enjoying Spring break. The unemployment insurance extension expired. There’s very little news on the subject. I could find nothing new about the COBRA benefits expiration. I really hope Congress enjoys their Spring break. When they get back, 200,000 people will have fallen out the end of the benefits pipeline. I would also like to point out that over half of state unemployment insurance funds face insolvency. A majority of the states are dependent upon cash infusions from DC. C’est La Politics.

I have to gauge this report on a relative basis. Otherwise, every report since this downturn began would be evaluated as “Things are absolutely terrible.” That would be the summary for any week with a new claims number over 400k. On a relative basis, this week’s report wasn’t particularly terrible, except for the fact that we really need continued improvement. We’re back on a track of higher revisions. That’s not good. There hasn’t been any big events causing the breakdown (and the breakdown has been fairly small), but there hasn’t been much reason for things to get better, either.