Jobless claims, by themselves, are meaningless. They only have meaning when linked to the labor pool. If jobless claims dropped 514,000 and the labor pool expanded by 125,000 simultaneously, *that* is an indication that things are getting better.
If jobless claims dropped 514,000 and the labor pool dropped by 600,000 that would be an indication that things are getting worse, and that folks are too discouraged to even look for work.
It would be nice to see more than that single statistic as a proxy for the entire employment situation.
Well the labor pool expectedly has been going down so the ratio must be worse than unexpected. The expected the expectations to be better.