There are 18 million more continuing UI claims than one year ago: Congress must pass relief package
Another 1.1 million people applied for unemployment insurance (UI) benefits last week, including 793,000 people who applied for regular state UI and 335,000 who applied for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA). The 1.1 million who applied for UI last week was roughly unchanged from the prior week (down 53,000). The four-week moving average of total claims was also flat (down 15,000). Total initial claims are roughly where they were in mid-October.
Last week was the 47th straight week total initial claims were greater than the worst week of the Great Recession. (If that comparison is restricted to regular state claims—because we didn’t have PUA in the Great Recession—initial claims last week were still greater than the third-worst week of the Great Recession.)
Continuing unemployment claims in all programs, March 23, 2019–January 23, 2021: *Use caution interpreting trends over time because of reporting issues (see below)*
Date | Regular state UI | PEUC | PUA | Other programs (mostly EB and STC) |
---|---|---|---|---|
2019-03-23 | 1,905,627 | 31,510 | ||
2019-03-30 | 1,858,954 | 31,446 | ||
2019-04-06 | 1,727,261 | 30,454 | ||
2019-04-13 | 1,700,689 | 30,404 | ||
2019-04-20 | 1,645,387 | 28,281 | ||
2019-04-27 | 1,630,382 | 29,795 | ||
2019-05-04 | 1,536,652 | 27,937 | ||
2019-05-11 | 1,540,486 | 28,727 | ||
2019-05-18 | 1,506,501 | 27,949 | ||
2019-05-25 | 1,519,345 | 26,263 | ||
2019-06-01 | 1,535,572 | 26,905 | ||
2019-06-08 | 1,520,520 | 25,694 | ||
2019-06-15 | 1,556,252 | 26,057 | ||
2019-06-22 | 1,586,714 | 25,409 | ||
2019-06-29 | 1,608,769 | 23,926 | ||
2019-07-06 | 1,700,329 | 25,630 | ||
2019-07-13 | 1,694,876 | 27,169 | ||
2019-07-20 | 1,676,883 | 30,390 | ||
2019-07-27 | 1,662,427 | 28,319 | ||
2019-08-03 | 1,676,979 | 27,403 | ||
2019-08-10 | 1,616,985 | 27,330 | ||
2019-08-17 | 1,613,394 | 26,234 | ||
2019-08-24 | 1,564,203 | 27,253 | ||
2019-08-31 | 1,473,997 | 25,003 | ||
2019-09-07 | 1,462,776 | 25,909 | ||
2019-09-14 | 1,397,267 | 26,699 | ||
2019-09-21 | 1,380,668 | 26,641 | ||
2019-09-28 | 1,390,061 | 25,460 | ||
2019-10-05 | 1,366,978 | 26,977 | ||
2019-10-12 | 1,384,208 | 27,501 | ||
2019-10-19 | 1,416,816 | 28,088 | ||
2019-10-26 | 1,420,918 | 28,576 | ||
2019-11-02 | 1,447,411 | 29,080 | ||
2019-11-09 | 1,457,789 | 30,024 | ||
2019-11-16 | 1,541,860 | 31,593 | ||
2019-11-23 | 1,505,742 | 29,499 | ||
2019-11-30 | 1,752,141 | 30,315 | ||
2019-12-07 | 1,725,237 | 32,895 | ||
2019-12-14 | 1,796,247 | 31,893 | ||
2019-12-21 | 1,773,949 | 29,888 | ||
2019-12-28 | 2,143,802 | 32,517 | ||
2020-01-04 | 2,245,684 | 32,520 | ||
2020-01-11 | 2,137,910 | 33,882 | ||
2020-01-18 | 2,075,857 | 32,625 | ||
2020-01-25 | 2,148,764 | 35,828 | ||
2020-02-01 | 2,084,204 | 33,884 | ||
2020-02-08 | 2,095,001 | 35,605 | ||
2020-02-15 | 2,057,774 | 34,683 | ||
2020-02-22 | 2,101,301 | 35,440 | ||
2020-02-29 | 2,054,129 | 33,053 | ||
2020-03-07 | 1,973,560 | 32,803 | ||
2020-03-14 | 2,071,070 | 34,149 | ||
2020-03-21 | 3,410,969 | 36,758 | ||
2020-03-28 | 8,158,043 | 0 | 52,494 | 48,963 |
2020-04-04 | 12,444,309 | 3,802 | 69,537 | 64,201 |
2020-04-11 | 16,249,334 | 31,426 | 216,481 | 89,915 |
2020-04-18 | 17,756,054 | 63,720 | 1,172,238 | 116,162 |
2020-04-25 | 21,723,230 | 91,724 | 3,629,986 | 158,031 |
2020-05-02 | 20,823,294 | 173,760 | 6,361,532 | 175,289 |
2020-05-09 | 22,725,217 | 252,257 | 8,120,137 | 216,576 |
2020-05-16 | 18,791,926 | 252,952 | 11,281,930 | 226,164 |
2020-05-23 | 19,022,578 | 546,065 | 10,010,509 | 247,595 |
2020-05-30 | 18,548,442 | 1,121,306 | 9,597,884 | 259,499 |
2020-06-06 | 18,330,293 | 885,802 | 11,359,389 | 325,282 |
2020-06-13 | 17,552,371 | 783,999 | 13,093,382 | 336,537 |
2020-06-20 | 17,316,689 | 867,675 | 14,203,555 | 392,042 |
2020-06-27 | 16,410,059 | 956,849 | 12,308,450 | 373,841 |
2020-07-04 | 17,188,908 | 964,744 | 13,549,797 | 495,296 |
2020-07-11 | 16,221,070 | 1,016,882 | 13,326,206 | 513,141 |
2020-07-18 | 16,691,210 | 1,122,677 | 13,259,954 | 518,584 |
2020-07-25 | 15,700,971 | 1,193,198 | 10,984,864 | 609,328 |
2020-08-01 | 15,112,240 | 1,262,021 | 11,504,089 | 433,416 |
2020-08-08 | 14,098,536 | 1,376,738 | 11,221,790 | 549,603 |
2020-08-15 | 13,792,016 | 1,381,317 | 13,841,939 | 469,028 |
2020-08-22 | 13,067,660 | 1,434,638 | 15,164,498 | 523,430 |
2020-08-29 | 13,283,721 | 1,547,611 | 14,786,785 | 490,514 |
2020-09-05 | 12,373,201 | 1,630,711 | 11,808,368 | 529,220 |
2020-09-12 | 12,363,489 | 1,832,754 | 12,153,925 | 510,610 |
2020-09-19 | 11,561,158 | 1,989,499 | 10,686,922 | 589,652 |
2020-09-26 | 10,172,332 | 2,824,685 | 10,978,217 | 579,582 |
2020-10-03 | 8,952,580 | 3,334,878 | 10,450,384 | 668,691 |
2020-10-10 | 8,038,175 | 3,711,089 | 10,622,725 | 615,066 |
2020-10-17 | 7,436,321 | 3,983,613 | 9,332,610 | 778,746 |
2020-10-24 | 6,837,941 | 4,143,389 | 9,433,127 | 746,403 |
2020-10-31 | 6,452,002 | 4,376,847 | 8,681,647 | 806,430 |
2020-11-07 | 6,037,690 | 4,509,284 | 9,147,753 | 757,496 |
2020-11-14 | 5,890,220 | 4,569,016 | 8,869,502 | 834,740 |
2020-11-21 | 5,213,781 | 4,532,876 | 8,555,763 | 741,078 |
2020-11-28 | 5,766,130 | 4,801,408 | 9,244,556 | 834,685 |
2020-12-05 | 5,457,941 | 4,793,230 | 9,271,112 | 841,463 |
2020-12-12 | 5,393,839 | 4,810,334 | 8,453,940 | 937,972 |
2020-12-19 | 5,205,841 | 4,491,413 | 8,383,387 | 1,070,810 |
2020-12-26 | 5,347,440 | 4,166,261 | 7,442,888 | 1,450,438 |
2021-01-02 | 5,727,359 | 3,026,952 | 5,707,397 | 1,526,887 |
2021-01-09 | 5,446,993 | 3,863,008 | 7,334,682 | 1,638,247 |
2021-01-16 | 5,188,211 | 3,604,894 | 7,218,801 | 1,826,573 |
2021-01-23 | 5,155,916 | 4,777,842 | 8,715,306 | 1,785,954 |
Click here for notes.
Data are not seasonally adjusted. A full list of programs can be found in the bottom panel of the table on page 4 at this link: https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf.
Source: U.S. Employment and Training Administration, Initial Claims [ICSA], retrieved from Department of Labor (DOL), https://oui.doleta.gov/unemploy/docs/persons.xls and https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf, February 11, 2021.
Figure A shows continuing claims in all programs over time (the latest data are for January 23). Continuing claims are currently more than 18 million above where they were a year ago. The large increase in continuing claims in the most recent data was due to increases in PUA and PEUC. This is likely workers who had exhausted their original weeks of eligibility getting back on these programs. Remember, former President Trump allowed these programs to lapse before he signed the December bill that extended them.
The 11-week extensions of PEUC and PUA passed in December just kick the can down the road—they are not long enough. Congress must pass further extensions before mid-March, or millions will exhaust benefits at that time, when the virus is still rampant and the labor market is still weak. In January, there were 25.5 million workers—15.0% of the workforce—who were either unemployed or otherwise out of work because of the virus or who had seen a drop in hours and pay because of the pandemic. Roughly $2 trillion in relief and recovery is crucial.
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