Weekly claims for unemployment insurance drops

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) — First-time claims for unemployment insurance in Louisiana for the week ending March 2, decreased from the previous week's total.

The state labor department figures released Friday show the initial claims dropped to 2,887 from the previous week's total of 2,918. Initial claims were below the comparable week a year earlier at 3,302.

The four-week moving average, which is a less volatile measure of claims, decreased to 2,765 from the previous week's total of 2,825.

Continued unemployment claims claimed for the week ending March 2 decreased to 28,217, compared to the previous week's total of 28,501. The four-week moving average for such claims decrease to 28,900 from the previous week's average of 29,626.