Initial Jobless Claims Head Back Up

This goes against the optimistic narrative I’ve been offering, but initial jobless claims are back up this week, though still (ever so slightly) below the 400,000 line that roughly divides an improving situation from a worsening one: “In the week ending January 7, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 399,000, an increase of 24,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 375,000. The 4-week moving average was 381,750, an increase of 7,750 from the previous week’s revised average of 374,000.”