Jobless Claims Decline; Orders For Durable Goods Drop

The number of Americans who filed first-time claims for jobless benefits fell by 5,000 last week, to 382,000, the Employment and Training Administration just reported.

That's the good news.

On the other hand, orders for so-called durable goods fell 0.9 percent in February from January, the Census Bureau says. Still, The Associated Press notes that "even with the February decline, durable goods orders were 24.6 percent above the recession low hit in March 2009." Copyright 2011 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.