Guess what? US jobless claims are still low.

Thursday’s initial claims headline printed 225,000, above estimates but comfortably within the forecast range. Four-dozen or so economists tossed out guesses than ran the gamut from 215,000 to 230,000. The prior week’s print, which counted as a four-month low, was revised marginally higher to 219,000.

The week-to-week increase is immaterial for the policy narrative. If anything, it just underscores the resilience of the US labor market, which was also on display in a firm read on private sector hiring from ADP ahead of Friday’s all-important BLS release.

Technically, claims rose the most since late July, but presenting it that way seems somehow hyperbolic. Claims are low. The four-week moving average is 224,250. We can’t even see problem levels from here.

Continuing claims for the week to September 21 were 1.826 million. That matched (basically) the lowest estimate from 14 economists, and was 1,000 lower from the prior week’s reading, which was revised down by 7,000.

I said this last week, and I’ll say it again: I’m open to the idea that the initial filers series isn’t very useful anymore, but if we’re supposed to pay attention to it, then we’re compelled to admit that it isn’t anywhere close to suggesting mass layoffs are afoot.

I guess — and really I’m just editorializing off the cuff here — that strikes, plural, could impact the headline in the weeks ahead. But those aren’t “real” claims. If anything, those claims would be hawkish for policy to the extent they invariably presage higher wages, unless you think striking workers will back down.

Elsewhere, the Challenger headline showed 72,821 job cut announcements in September. That was actually lower versus August, albeit not by a lot.

Last month’s cuts were sharply higher — nearly 54% — versus the same month a year ago.

For context, total announced cuts in Q3 were 174,597. That was down 16% sequentially and up 19% from Q3 of 2023. YTD, job cut plans sum to 609,242, around the same as the cumulative total for Q1-Q3 last year.

The release described “an inflection point.” The US labor market “could stall or tighten,” Andrew Challenger said, adding that it’ll “take a few months” for Fed cuts “to impact employer costs, as well as consumer savings accounts.” Spending, he went on, “is projected to increase, which may lead to more demand for workers in consumer-facing sectors.”

Oh, and AI was “blamed” for 5,616 of last month’s job cuts. According to Challenger, robots have replaced 12,742 humans in 2024, nearly all in tech. That’s three times as many as 2023.