Jobless claims fall below 300,000 for the first time since pandemic hit

The number of Americans filing for initial unemployment claims has fallen below 300,000 for the first time since the pandemic began.

Some 293,000 first-time applications for unemployment benefits were filed last week, the Labor Department said Thursday. That's the smallest number of people to apply for benefits since March 2020, when the pandemic intensified, and the second weekly drop in claims.

All told, some 3.6 million people were receiving some sort of jobless aid in the last week of September.