WASHINGTON, April 9 (Reuters) – Unemployment registrations in the United States fell less than expected during the week to April 4 but remain close to their highest historical levels due to the impact on activity of the measures fight against coronavirus, show Thursday the weekly statistics of the Labor Department.
The number of unemployment benefit claims fell to 6.606 million last week compared to 6.867 million the previous week. Economists polled by Reuters on average predicted a more marked decline to 5.25 million.
Over the past three weeks, more than 15 million Americans have registered as unemployed.
Registrations for the week as of March 28 have been revised up from an initial estimate of 6.648 million.
The four-week moving average rose sharply to 4.27 million against 2.67 million (revised) the previous week.
The number of people regularly receiving compensation more than doubled to 7.455 million during the week to March 28 (last week for which these figures are available) against 3.059 million the previous week.
Statistics table
(Lucia Mutikani, French version Marc Angrand, edited by Jean-Michel Bélot)
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