The number of new jobless claims just reached its lowest level since November of 1969. That alone is impressive, but to truly get an understanding of the tightness of today’s labor market it has to be compared to the size of the U.S. labor force. Indeed, the U.S. labor force has more than doubled over the last 49 years from 81,106,000 people to 161,776,000 last month. Jobless claims adjusted for the size of the U.S. labor force, are now at the lowest level since the Department of Labor started reporting monthly jobless claims in 1967.
