Valley had best decline in unemployment claims

Staff report

YOUNGSTOWN

The Mahoning Valley had the best decline in the level of new unemployment claims last week among six other metro areas, an economist said.

The level of unemployment claims is determined from the average of the past four weeks using nonseasonally adjusted data released Thursday from the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.

There was an average of 555 new claims from the past four weeks in the Valley, compared with 742 claims during the same period in 1999, which is the best year for comparison because there was job growth throughout it, said economist George Zeller.

Claims declined by 25.1 percent. “That is the largest decline we had [in Ohio],” he said.

During the same time period a year ago, the level of new claims in the Valley was 627. The level of new claims last week was 245 in Mahoning County, with 214 claims in Trumbull County. Columbiana had 97 new claims. All three counties’ level of unemployment claims were below the levels during the same period in 1999.

“All three counties had good figures this week,” Zeller said.

Average new claims in Ohio as of last week were 8,939, compared with 10,470 claims in 1999 — a 14.7 percent decrease.

Zeller said there was some distortion in the data due to the cold weather and post-Christmas layoffs of seasonal jobs.

Nationally, the four-week average for new claims was 283,250, a decrease of 6,500 from the previous week’s average of 289,750, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.