Worker filings for jobless benefits have eased since the start of the year, one of several signs the jobs market is slowly recovering, as Covid-19 vaccination efforts expand.
Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal expect that 750,000 workers filed for unemployment benefits for the week ended Feb. 27, a slight increase from the prior week and above pre-pandemic levels.
Weekly jobless claims filings—a proxy for layoffs—fell sharply last week and have trended downward since an early year peak of over 900,000 at the beginning of January. However, they remain above the pre-pandemic peak of 695,000.
“We’ve still got a long ways to go, though it may not seem that way,” Ryan Sweet, an economist at Moody’s Analytics, said of the U.S. labor market. “We’ve still got a big hole to dig ourselves out of.”
Still, Mr. Sweet said the overall outlook is improving, as virus cases decline and vaccines are more widely distributed. Some states are also easing restrictions. New York on Wednesday said it would ease Covid-19 restrictions on the size of sports and entertainment gatherings, and Texas on Tuesday said it would end a statewide mask mandate.
