The number of unemployed getting jobless benefits just fell to a 17-month low. It's not all good news.

By Jeffry Bartash

More people are running out of benefits before they find a job

The number of people collecting unemployment checks from the government fell in March to a one-and-a-half-year low. Great news, right?

Not entirely.

The U.S. is enjoying low unemployment even though businesses are barely adding any new jobs these days. Mass layoffs are uncommon, and most companies are retaining the bulk of their employees.

The result is what economists call a "low-hire, low-fire" labor market.

That's fine and dandy if you already have a job. It's not so great if you don't.

Take the decline in so-called continuing jobless claims - the number of people who lost a job and now receive unemployment benefits.

These claims fell in mid-March to 1.82 million, the government said Thursday, touching the lowest level since October 2024.

The decline in continuing claims is not a new trend. They hit a postpandemic peak of nearly 2 million last summer and have been moving lower ever since.

Some of the decline reflects a modest improvement in the job market. Hiring is still weak, but employment has risen slightly since November.

By contrast, the economy lost jobs in the summer and early fall of 2025.

A bigger part of the story, though, is that people are remaining unemployed for longer periods of time. Some simply run out of benefits before they find a new job.

In February, for example, some 1.9 million people said they had been without a job for 27 weeks or more, according to a separate monthly report on U.S. employment.

That's the second-highest tally since the U.S. emerged from the pandemic.

By comparison, just 1.1 million people reported they were out of work for 27 weeks or longer in February 2020, a month before the pandemic erupted in the United States.

Unemployment benefits in every state except Massachusetts run out after 26 weeks or less. Once a person reaches that limit, they fall out of the data for continuing claims.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics calculated that nearly 37% of the people getting unemployment checks exhausted their benefits in February. The exhaustion rate has climbed steadily, from 35.4% one year earlier and 33% in February 2024.

It's not a good trend, but as long as overall layoffs remain low, the unemployment rate is expected to stay low, too. The jobless rate registered 4.4% in February, a very low rate historically.

"Hiring has slowed to a near standstill compared to a year ago, yet employers are still holding on to workers, and layoffs remain subdued," said Jim Baird, chief investment officer at Plante Moran Financial Advisors.

-Jeffry Bartash

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