The Labor Department announced on Dec. 16, that Americans filing for unemployment benefits rose as the labor market hit a slight bump in its recovery from last year’s CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus pandemic. Jobless claims rose to 206,000 last week by 18,000, bouncing off of the prior week’s 52-year low, which was higher than the estimated median economic forecast of 195,000 claims for the week. The four-week average, which smooths out week-to-week volatility, whose previous week’s sum in unemployment claims were revised to 188,000 from the 184,000 initially estimated, is still at the lowest level since mid-November 1969. Continuing claims fell to 1.85 million for the week that ended Dec. 4, down by 154,000 from the previous week, which beat estimates. The steady decline in new claims is an encouraging sign that fewer people are being laid off, though the labor market has yet to fully recover from pre-pandemic numbers. “As expected, …