Well, maybe not the happiest year ending, but it did go down a bit

We have been tracking new weekly claims for unemployment insurance in California as a labor market indicator. And claims did go down a bit. That result might have been chalked up to the fact that Christmas Day was the last day of the week (Saturday) and offices tended to be closed or close early on Friday. So - still not back to a normal level - but, who knows? Maybe it's the start of something good.

As always, the latest data are at https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf.