AP Wire

Initial jobless claims in La. fall

by The Associated Press

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — First-time claims for unemployment insurance in Louisiana for the week ending Dec. 5 decreased from the previous week's total.

The state labor department figures released Friday show the initial claims fell to 2,414 from the previous week's total of 2,554. For the comparable week a year earlier, there were 2,796.

The four-week moving average, which is a less volatile measure of claims, increased to 2,642 from the previous week's total of 2,490.

Continued unemployment claims claimed for the week ending Dec. 5 decreased to 21,501 compared to 23,143 the previous week.

The four-week moving average for such claims decreased to 21,460 from the previous week's average of 21,692.