Weekly Initial Unemployment Claims decline to 298,000, Q3 GDP Revised up to 3.6%

The BEA reports:

Real gross domestic product -- the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States -- increased at an annual rate of 3.6 percent in the third quarter of 2013 (that is, from the second quarter to the third quarter), according to the "second" estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. ... The GDP estimate released today is based on more complete source data than were available for the "advance" estimate issued last month. In the advance estimate, the increase in real GDP was 2.8 percent

The upward revision to the percent change in real GDP primarily reflected upward revisions to private inventory investment and to nonresidential fixed investment that were partly offset by an upward revision to imports and a downward revision to exports

The DOL reports:

In the week ending November 30, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 298,000, a decrease of 23,000 from the previous week's revised figure of 321,000. The 4-week moving average was 322,250, a decrease of 10,750 from the previous week's revised average of 333,000.

The previous week was up from 316,000.

The following graph shows the 4-week moving average of weekly claims since January 2000.

Click on graph for larger image.


The dashed line on the graph is the current 4-week average. The four-week average of weekly unemployment claims decreased to 322,250.

The level of weekly claims suggests an improving labor market.