Here is a chart of the four-week average of seasonally-adjusted initial claims for unemployment in Washington state. While the most recent values are above the average for 2006 and 2007, the two years preceding the great recession, these values are slightly below the average for 1999 and 2000, the two years preceding the dot-com collapse.

My thanks to Karen Gibeau of the Employment Security Department and Bret Bertolin of the Economic and Revenue Forecast Council for providing these data to me.