High-Frequency Update: 11-2-25

Arizona initial claims for unemployment insurance ticked up to 2,627 for the week ended October 25, up from 2,612 the prior week. That was down 12.5% over the year and down 32.3% from 2019.

U.S. weekly initial claims for unemployment insurance data will not be updated during the federal government shutdown.

The U.S. hotel occupancy rate dropped to 66.6% for the week ended October 25, down from 68.5% the prior week. That was down 3.5% over the year and down 5.5% from 2019.

U.S. movie box office sales rose to $108.2 million for the week ended October 30, up from $92.3 million the prior week. That was down 15.0% over the year and down 27.7% from 2019. New movie releases were down 44.5% from 2019.

U.S. TSA traveler throughput fell to 17.9 million for the week ended October 25, down from 18.7 million the prior week. That was up 0.7% over the year and up 8.0% from 2019.

Weekly data on Arizona new business applications continue to be published by the Census Bureau, but only on a monthly basis. Data for September has not been updated due to the federal government shutdown.

Data on seated diners at restaurants using the OpenTable app is no longer being updated to compare the current week to 2019 results.

As of October 15, 2022, Google stopped updating mobility data.

Key News Articles and Research (subscription may be required)

Curated by Valorie Rice, Senior Business Information Specialist

Arizona and general topics: Arizona has become the semiconductor capital of the country. Now what? (AR 10/22)
Automation / AI: Amazon plans to replace more than half a million jobs with robots (NYT 10/21)
Demographic / socioeconomic / Census: Needed: blueprint for a U.S. health system overhaul (RAND 10/22)
Education / early childhood development: Three waves of school vouchers: a history of expansion and exclusion (Brookings 10/21)
Energy / environment / infrastructure: From Utah to China, where in the world could Arizona copper sitting under an Apache holy site go? (KJZZ 10/20)
Housing / real estate: From $5B to $25B, AZ’s construction industry is booming and needs workers (AR 10/13)
Mexico/trade: Trump says he will raise tariffs on Canada by 10% over Ontario ad (WSJ 10/26)
Prices/inflation: How tariffs are affecting prices in 2025 (FRBSL 10/16)
Public finance: With sales tax revenues lagging, Tucson officials eye spending cuts (AZPM 10/22)
Wages/income/wealth: Here’s what it takes to be in Arizona’s top 1% of earners (PBJ 10/26)
Workforce/employment/labor market: Government shutdown squeezes Arizona federal workers, turns lives ‘upside down’ (Cronkite 10/21)