Nov. 4 (UPI) -- The U.S. labor market keeps getting closer to a prepandemic low for weekly unemployment claims.
The Labor Department said in its weekly report Thursday that there were 269,000 new jobless claims last week, a decline of 14,000 filings from the previous week.
The figure is a new low for the COVID19 era, and just 13,000 claims higher than the last prepandemic figure -- 256,000 in the middle of March 2020.
Although the coronavirus crisis was present in mid-March of last year, it's generally agreed among analysts that the health crisis had yet to fully affect the U.S. economy by then.
"For the fifth consecutive week, initial unemployment claims are down," President Joe Biden said in a statement.
"It is clear that America is in the midst of an historic economic recovery, unique across the world. We still have much left to do to finish that recovery ... but today's news is further evidence that we are making strong and steady progress."
There were just over 2.1 million continuing claims, the department said, which lag initial claims by a week.
The largest increases in new claims were reported in Kentucky, Missouri and Florida. The largest decreases in new filings were seen in California, Georgia and Michigan.
Wednesday, ADP and Moody's Analytics reported that 571,000 private-sector jobs were added nationwide during the month of October. The Labor Department will release its official jobs report on Friday.
