Week ended Sept. 11 jobless claims rise as Covid wave hits

September 16, 2021 — Week ended Sept. 11 jobless claims rose  20,000 to a total of 332,000, following a pandemic low in the prior week, a sign that rising Covid-19 infections are harming economy, the US Department of Labor reports.

Applications for unemployment benefits had been steadily decreasing as a number of states cut jobless benefits. More than 8 million people lost all their unemployment benefits last when two federal programs covering gig workers and people who have been jobless for more than six months expired.

Seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 1.9 percent for the week ending September 4, a decrease of 0.2 percentage point from the previous week’s revised rate. The previous week’s rate was revised up by 0.1
from 2 to 2.1 percent. The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending
September 4 was 2,665,000, a decrease of 187,000 from the previous week’s revised level.

This is the lowest level for insured unemployment since March 14, 2020 when it was 1,770,000. The previous week’s level was revised up 69,000  from 2,783,000 to 2,852,000. The 4-week moving average was 2,807,500, a decrease of 50,000 from the previous week’s revised average. This is the lowest level for this average since March 21, 2020 when it was 2,071,750. The previous week’s average was revised up by 17,250 from 2,840,250 to 2,857,500.

The number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 262,619 in the week ending
September 11, a decrease of 23,331 (or –8.2 percent) from the previous week. The seasonal factors had expected a
decrease of 43,520 (or –15.2 percent) from the previous week. There were 785,842 initial claims in the comparable week in 2020. In addition, for the week ending September 11, 45 states reported 28,456 initial claims for Pandemic
Unemployment Assistance.

The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 1.7 percent during the week ending September 4, a decrease of 0.2 percentage point from the prior week. The advance unadjusted level of insured unemployment in state programs totaled 2,328,822, a decrease of 339,821 (or –12.7 percent) from the preceding week.

The seasonal factors had expected a decrease of 153,177 (or –5.7 percent) from the previous week. A year earlier the rate was 8.5 percent and the volume was 12,407,776.

The total number of continued weeks claimed for benefits in all programs for the week ending August 28 was
12,106,727, an increase of 178,937 from the previous week. There were 30,383,772 weekly claims filed for benefits in all programs in the comparable week in 2020.

During the week ending August 28, Extended Benefits were available in the following 10 states: Alaska, California,
Connecticut, District of Columbia, Illinois, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, and Texas.

Initial claims for UI benefits filed by former Federal civilian employees totaled 543 in the week ending September 4, an increase of 1 from the prior week. There were 547 initial claims filed by newly discharged veterans, an increase of 59 from the preceding week.

There were 8,723 continued weeks claimed filed by former Federal civilian employees the week ending August 28, an increase of 425 from the previous week. Newly discharged veterans claiming benefits totaled 6,054, an increase of 67 from the prior week.

During the week ending August 28, 47 states reported 5,487,233 continued weekly claims for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance benefits and 47 states reported 3,805,795 continued claims for Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation benefits.

The highest insured unemployment rates in the week ending August 28 were in Puerto Rico (4.5), California (3.7), New Jersey (3.4), District of Columbia (3.3), Illinois (3.1), New York (3.0), Rhode Island (2.9), Connecticut (2.8), Georgia (2.8), and Hawaii (2.6).

The largest increases in initial claims for the week ending September 4 were in Louisiana (+7,664), Michigan (+5,318), California (+1,209), Kansas (+528), and Nevada (+420), while the largest decreases were in Missouri (-6,949), New York (-3,020), Florida (-2,482), Tennessee (-1,923), and Georgia (-1,8