New unemployment claims nationwide continued to trend lower last week, with 1.427 million initial claims, down 55,000 from the previous week.
Total new claims for unemployment benefits in D.C., Maryland and Virginia stalled at 58,017, down from 60,915 the previous week, with new claims falling in both the District and Maryland, and rising in Virginia.
In a separate report, the Labor Department said the national June unemployment rate fell to 11.1%, down from 12.4% in May.
It also reports the number of jobs, either new or brought back in June, totaled 4.8 million.
The unemployment rate for the D.C. metro area in May, the most recent data available from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, fell to 9.0%, from 9.5% in April.
The Labor Department does not break out initial unemployment claims numbers by metropolitan area.
First-time claims for D.C., Maryland and Virginia during the most recent two weeks, on an unadjusted basis:
District of Columbia:
Week ending June 27: 3,026
Week ending June 20: 3,073
Maryland:
Week ending June 27: 21,929
Week ending June 20: 32,549
Virginia:
Week ending June 27: 33,062
Week ending June 20: 25,293
