Weekly unemployment claims inch up

The new figure comes as Washington policymakers are still haggling over how to give the economy a spark, and a day before the Labor Department releases the all-important September jobs numbers. In its last monthly report, the federal government said the economy created a net of zero jobs in August, with the unemployment rate stuck at 9.1 percent.

{mosads}President Obama is scheduled to hold a news conference this morning, in which the economy will almost certainly be a key topic. Ben Bernanke, the chairman of the Federal Reserve, also told lawmakers this week that the economic recovery was “close to faltering.”

Still, there do appear to be some positive signs from this week’s initial claims figure, despite the uptick.

After last week’s figure dropped by more than 30,000, analysts expected more of a correction this time around. But this week’s figure was lower than the 410,000 claims projected by economists surveyed by Bloomberg.

The four-week average of claims, considered a less volatile measure, also dropped this week, from 418,000 to 414,000.