BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — First-time claims for jobless payments dropped in Louisiana last week to a level below that of a year ago.
The Louisiana Workforce Commission says there were 4,498 new claims for the week ending Oct. 3, down from 4,519 the previous week. For the comparable week in October 2008, there were 4,803 initial claims.
Continued payment weeks, an indicator of those still looking for work, fell slightly last week to 59,096 from the previous week’s 59,921. For the comparable week a year ago, there were 34,328 continued weeks of benefits.
In the latest tally, the labor agency says the construction sector had the largest week-to-week drop in continued payment weeks.
 
—-Contact The Daily Reveille news staff at [email protected]