Unadjusted Year Over Year: Labor Department Initial Jobless Claims Up 10.7%

Here's the scoop on the Labor Department's weekly initial jobs claims report:

• Associated Press Headline And Lead: "New jobless claims rise more than expected to 531K... The number of newly laid-off workers filing claims for jobless benefits rose more than expected last week, as employers remain reluctant to hire even with the economy showing signs of recovery."
• Labor Department News Release: click here. 
• Key Numbers: "The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 460,449 in the week ending Oct. 17, a decrease of 49,113 from the previous week. There were 416,111 initial claims in the comparable week in 2008."
• My Spreadsheet (click Download 20091015yoy).

Here's my uneducated interpretation - Initial jobless claims were bad again this week and still 100K over the same point in time for 2002. Mid-october 2002 was the Internet Bubble crash's low for the stock market and unemployment didn't start falling until Q2 2003 (see graph below). Seems to me that initial jobless claims indicate that unemployment is still rising and that the stock market is due for a correction.

MontyHigh, www.worldofwallstreet.us