More than 30 million Americans have filed for unemployment insurance due to the coronavirus pandemic, including another 3.8 million Americans who filed claims last week, according to the Labor Department. Since businesses began to close to slow the spread of the virus six weeks ago, 30.3 million Americans have filed claims. But the number is likely higher because many people have struggled to file unemployment insurance as systems have been bogged down by the staggering number of claims. CBS News campaign reporter Adam Brewster says a survey from the Economic Policy Institute found that for every ten people who successfully filed for benefits, another five to six either could not get through to make a claim or didn’t try because it was too difficult to do so.
“Millions of the newly jobless are going without benefits as the unemployment system buckles under the weight of new claims,” EPI economists Ben Zipperer and Elise Gould wrote. Thursday’s Labor Department report also showed that 12.4% of American workers were receiving unemployment benefits for the week ending April 18. Before the pandemic, the highest weekly percentage recorded was 7% back in 1975. The peak during the Great Recession was 5% during two different weeks in May and June of 2009.
CBS
May 1, 2020
The true number of people out of work is certainly much higher, as many have not been able to file for jobless aid. A survey from the Economic Policy Institute found that, for every 10 people who successfully filed for unemployment benefits, between five and seven others either couldn’t apply or were too discouraged to try.
“Millions of the newly jobless are going without benefits as the unemployment system buckles under the weight of new claims,” wrote EPI researchers Ben Zipperer and Elise Gould.
CBS News
May 1, 2020
As policymakers scramble to try to mitigate the economic fallout of the coronavirus shock, a predictable chorus has emerged worrying that these efforts will lead to damaging increases in the nation’s public debt. The Washington Post and New York Times have been among the outlets sounding alarms over the implications of increased government spending. And even Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) warned against further economic stimulus, saying: “given the extraordinary numbers that we’re racking up to the national debt … we need to be as cautious as we can be.”
In These Times
May 1, 2020
The left-leaning Economic Policy Institute found in an online poll that for every 10 people who have successfully filed unemployment claims, three or four people have been unable to register and another two people have not tried to apply at a time of acute economic crisis.
EPI’s survey indicates that an additional 8.9 million to 13.9 million people have been shut out of the system, said Ben Zipperer, the study’s lead author.
“This study validates the anecdotes and news reports we’re seeing about people having trouble filing for benefits they need and deserve,” Zipperer said.
Reuters
May 1, 2020
For every 10 people who successfully filed for unemployment insurance benefits over four weeks in March and April, an additional three to four people tried and failed to make claims, according to a survey released Tuesday by the Economic Policy Institute.
“These findings imply the official count of unemployment insurance claims likely drastically understates the extent of employment reductions and the need for economic relief during the coronavirus crisis,” the study’s authors, Ben Zipperer and Elise Gould, wrote.
CNBC
May 1, 2020
“I think it is forcing people to make a tough choice,” said Elise Gould, a senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute. “It certainly doesn’t feel like it was the intention of the CARES Act to put workers in that difficult position of choosing between their health and their economic wellbeing.”
WJLA
May 1, 2020
The Labor Department doesn’t release jobless claims by industry. So, building on the work of economist Ben Zipperer and his colleagues at the Economic Policy Institute, we analyzed industry-specific new unemployment-benefit claims from 14 states that publish them. (For a full list, see the charts below.)
The Washington Times
May 1, 2020
Heidi Shierholz, senior economist and director of policy at the Economic Policy Institute, says Graham is just plain wrong about how unemployment benefits work.
“You can’t just quit your job and get unemployment benefits,” Shierholz said during a Wednesday phone interview. She noted that during this crisis, workers can get unemployment insurance if they are forced to stop working to care for a sick family member or take care of a child who’s school has closed, but they cannot just quit their jobs for no reason and receive benefits.
Shierholz said 16% of Americans will likely be unemployed after July 31. Cutting off all additional benefits at such a time is “cruel and will lead to an enormous amount of human suffering and it’s bad economics,” she said, adding that unemployment insurance “is a really really good way to get money into the economy.”
The American Independent
May 1, 2020
Guest: Heidi Shierholz, Director of Policy, Economic Policy Institute, Former Chief Economist, US Department of Labor
More than 24 million Americans have filed for unemployment benefits since mid-March. That’s 20 times the number of people who were applying for unemployment before the pandemic hit. If every man, woman and child living in the state of Florida filed for unemployment over the last month, you still wouldn’t reach that 24 million number. And it’s getting bigger. Where is all the money to pay those unemployment benefits coming from – and how long will it last?
BYU Radio
May 1, 2020