Uptick reported in New Hampshire first-time unemployment claims

If you thought New Hampshire’s unemployment rate couldn’t go any lower, you may have been right. For the past 20 months, the state’s unemployment climate has cooled off from a pandemic-induced high to levels lower than they were before Covid-19 struck.

But now we’re is treading on level ground. Indeed, there may have been a slight upturn recently. Perhaps a surge in holiday demand is being overtaken by the latest surge in the pandemic and its effects, including a pullback in social interaction, supply chain and other disruptions, and workplaces and schools having to shut down because of outbreaks.

For the week ending Dec. 4, some 507 Granite Staters were laid off, a 40 percent increase from the previous week’s 362. While this could be due to the winter Covid surge, it also could be likely that the number is so small and that tiny fluctuations loom large.

Continuing claims – which are filed by people already collecting benefits – are more telling. Some 2,355 people filed for benefits during Thanksgiving week, which ended ending Nov. 27, similar to the number that filed the week after Halloween.

Nationally, unemployment claims have hit dropped by 17 percent, to 184,000, the lowest level since September 1969. And there was a 1.5 percent increase in continuing claims, which were a little under 2 million, about 100,000 fewer than a month ago.