Job seekers hold documents during the Mega JobNewsUSA South Florida Job Fair held at Amerant Bank Arena on September 25, 2026 in Sunrise, Florida.
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Employers continued to hold on to workers even as hiring remained weak, sending weekly jobless claims to the lowest level on record in nearly six decades.
Initial filings for unemployment insurance fell to a seasonally adjusted 194,000 for the week ended Oct. 17, the Labor Department reported Thursday.
That marked another lower leg in the low fire trend, with a total of just 189,000 reported for the week of July 18, the lowest since September 1969. Claims had averaged 212,000 last year, and the four-week moving average dropped to 197,750.
The numbers come against a backdrop of uncertainty for the labor market.
Nonfarm payrolls increased by only 29,000 in September and have an average gain of only 69,000 in the month of 2026. The unemployment rate rose to 4.2%, rising mainly due to a sharp spike in labor force participation. Layoffs remained low, falling to 61,000 in August, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data released Sept. 29.
Over the previous 12 months, the unemployment rate measured as a share of the total workforce fell to 1%, down 0.2 percentage points over the period. Job vacancies are relatively flat during the period.
“Despite the extremely pessimistic views expressed in the consumer confidence survey about the overall economy, countless headlines describing job cuts from various businesses, and the power of AI stealing, the claims data show that labor market conditions are stable,” said Thomas Simons, chief US economist at Jefferies, in a client note.
The data comes during the reference week that the BLS uses to calculate wage growth numbers. The September project report will be released November 5.
Federal Reserve officials meet next week to issue their latest decision on interest rates. Policymakers in recent days have characterized the labor market as a source of general strength and focus other attention on the problem of nettlesome inflation that has kept the pace of price increases well above the central bank’s 2% target.
Markets expect the Fed to hold off on a rate hike in October, but then increase it by another percentage point in December.