Weekly Unemployment Insurance Claims Increase

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — First-time claims for unemployment insurance in Louisiana for the week ending March 7 increased from the previous week's total.

The state labor department figures released Friday show the initial claims increased to 2,782 from the previous week's total of 2,559. For the comparable week a year earlier, there were 1,857.

Manufacturing had the highest over-the-week increase in initial claims, followed by health care and social assistance. Initial claims for mining, which employs oil and gas exploration and extraction workers, showed the third-highest increase over the week.

The four-week moving average, which is a less volatile measure of claims, decreased to 2,502 from the previous week's total of 2,541.

Continued unemployment claims claimed for the week ending March 7 decreased to 21,113 compared to 21,273 the previous week.

The four-week moving average for such claims decreased to 21,190 from the previous week's average of 21,243.