Here is the opening statement from the Department of Labor:

In the week ending June 23, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 227,000, an increase of 9,000 from the previous week's unrevised level of 218,000. The 4-week moving average was 222,000, an increase of 1,000 from the previous week's unrevised average of 221,000. The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment [See full report]

This morning's seasonally adjusted 227K new claims, up 9K from the previous week's figure, was above the Investing.com forecast of 220K.

Here is a close look at the data over the decade (with a callout for the past year), which gives a clearer sense of the overall trend in relation to the last recession.

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As we can see, there's a good bit of volatility in this indicator, which is why the 4-week moving average (the highlighted number) is a more useful number than the weekly data. Here is the complete data series.

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The headline Unemployment Insurance data is seasonally adjusted. What does the non-seasonally adjusted data look like? See the chart below, which clearly shows the extreme volatility of the non-adjusted data (the red dots). The 4-week MA gives an indication of the recurring pattern of seasonal change (note, for example, those regular January spikes). 

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Because of the extreme volatility of the non-adjusted weekly data, we can add a 52-week moving average to give a better sense of the secular trends. The chart below also has a linear regression through the data. We can see that this metric continues to fall below the long-term trend stretching back to 1968. 

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Annual Comparisons

Here is a calendar-year overlay since 2009 using the 4-week moving average. The purpose is to compare the annual slopes since the peak in the spring of 2009, near the end of the Great Recession.

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For an analysis of unemployment claims as a percent of the labor force, see regularly updated piece The Civilian Labor Force, Unemployment Claims and the Business Cycle Here is a snapshot from that analysis.

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