Labor Market
New applications for U.S. unemployment benefits fell to 194,000 in the week ending Oct. 17, the Labor Department reported Thursday, Oct. 22. Seasonally adjusted initial claims dropped 6,000 from the previous week’s revised level.
That is the lowest weekly reading since the week ending July 18, when claims were 189,000, according to the department’s seasonally adjusted series as published by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
The prior week was revised up by 1,000, from 199,000 to 200,000. That revision means claims touched 200,000 in the week ending Oct. 10 rather than staying below that mark, as first reported. The four-week moving average, which smooths out weekly swings, fell by 1,000 to 197,750. A year earlier, initial claims were 231,000 and the four-week average was 227,750.
Continuing claims move the other way
The number of people continuing to receive state unemployment benefits rose. Seasonally adjusted insured unemployment was 1,728,000 in the week ending Oct. 10, up 25,000 from the prior week’s revised level of 1,703,000. The prior week was revised down by 7,000. The insured unemployment rate held at 1.1%, compared with 1.3% a year earlier, when 1,947,000 people were receiving benefits.
The two measures answer different questions. Initial claims track new layoffs. Continuing claims show how many laid-off workers remain on benefits, which can rise when people take longer to find new jobs. This week’s report shows fewer new filings alongside a modest increase in people still collecting.
Before seasonal adjustment
States reported 172,390 initial claims before seasonal adjustment in the week ending Oct. 17, down 19,321, or 10.1%, from the week before. The department’s seasonal factors had expected a smaller decline of 14,179, so the drop was larger than usual for the time of year. In the comparable week of 2025, unadjusted claims were 205,653.
In the week ending Oct. 10, the latest week with state-by-state detail, the largest increases in initial claims were in Ohio (+3,918), Tennessee (+3,477), Pennsylvania (+1,954), California (+1,758) and Texas (+1,721). Ohio attributed its increase to layoffs in manufacturing, and Tennessee cited layoffs in educational services and manufacturing.
Initial claims from former federal civilian employees totaled 544 in the week ending Oct. 10, up 81 from the prior week and far below the 7,291 filed in the comparable week a year earlier.
Georgia
Georgia’s advance count of initial claims was 3,453 in the week ending Oct. 17, down 243 from 3,696 the week before, according to the release. These state figures are not seasonally adjusted, and the department notes that advance state claims are not directly comparable to prior weeks’ figures because they are counted by the state paying benefits rather than the claimant’s state of residence.
For the week ending Oct. 10, Georgia’s 3,696 initial claims were up 12 from the previous week and 761 below the same week a year earlier. Georgia insured unemployment, the number of people continuing to claim state benefits, was 21,273 in the advance count for the week ending Oct. 10, down from 22,724 a week earlier. In the week ending Oct. 3, the state’s insured unemployment rate was 0.5%, not seasonally adjusted, and the number of people claiming was 3,481 lower than a year earlier. These are statewide figures; the release does not break out metro Atlanta.
What it means for job seekers
The report continues to show low layoff activity nationally: new claims remain well below year-ago levels, and the four-week average is the lowest in the department’s six-week summary table. For people who have jobs, that points to relatively stable footing.
Low claims do not mean hiring is strong, however. The rise in continuing claims is a reminder that some workers who lose jobs are staying on benefits longer, and a single week of data can be revised, as the prior week’s figure was this week.
Sources
- U.S. Department of Labor, “Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims” news release, October 22, 2026. https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf
- Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (FRED), “Initial Claims (ICSA),” U.S. Employment and Training Administration, accessed October 22, 2026. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/ICSA
Featured photo: The front entrance and staircase of the U.S. Department of Labor's Frances Perkins Building at 200 Constitution Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., photographed Feb. 7, 2025. Photo: G. Edward Johnson, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 4.0). Cropped from the original.
