Andrew Ackerman at the Wall Street Journal parses the jobs data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and finds that a full one million Americans exhausted their jobless benefits in the past year. About 8.2 million idled workers were receiving unemployment benefits as of the week ended April 9, the Labor Department said in its weekly jobless claims report.
“„About 8.2 million idled workers were receiving unemployment benefits as of the week ended April 9, the Labor Department said in its weekly jobless claims report. This compares with about 10.5 million individuals at the same time last year, resulting in a decline of roughly 2.3 million people.
“„The federal government estimates that the economy created 1.3 million jobs during the 12 months ended in March.
“„“That leaves, roughly speaking, about 1 million people who have exhausted their unemployment benefits and have very likely not yet found a job,” said Joshua Shapiro, chief U.S. economist at MFR Inc. in New York.