Here are five economic reasons to be thankful this Thanksgiving. (Hat Tip to Neil Irwin who started doing this years ago) 1) The Unemployment Rate is Near 50 Year Low The unemployment rate was at 3.7% in October. The unemployment rate is down from 14.7% in April 2020 (the highest since the Great Depression). The unemployment rate is down from 4.6% a year ago (October 2021). This was just up from 3.5% in September - and that matched the lowest unemployment rate since 1969! 2) Low unemployment claims. This graph shows the 4-week moving average of weekly claims since 1971. Weekly claims were at 240,000 last week. The ... (full story)