222,000 people filed jobless claims in Florida last week as total approaches 2 million
New jobless claims in Florida last week climbed by 47,045 to 221,905, as the state approached the grim milestone of two million claims submitted since the coronavirus crisis began.
The latest initial jobless claims numbers are for the week ending May 9.
U.S. claims declined 195,000 to 2,981,000 for the week — but Thursday’s data release from the U.S. Department of Labor showed that millions more Americans continue to find themselves out of work each week. Over the past two months, nearly 37 million jobless claims have been filed in the U.S., representing about one in six workers.
Florida’s weekly claims figure has seen heavy volatility, most likely because Florida’s unemployment system has been plagued by dysfunction. The labor department’s figure lags Florida’s official jobless count, which as of May 12 has seen a total of 1.4 million unemployment unique filers since the crisis began. Fewer than half of that 1.4 million have been paid.
Should each of Florida’s nearly two million claims be verified, it would translate to a statewide unemployment rate of 22%. Multiple studies have foreshadowed that Florida’s peak unemployment rate will be above most other states’ given its economy’s dependence on tourism and hospitality, industries that have been most directly impacted by the crisis. This week, jobs site Indeed said South Florida’s job market had seen the greatest collapse in new job postings among all U.S. metro areas, with Orlando taking the No. 3 spot.
Last Friday, the Bureau of Labor statistics recorded the latest U.S. unemployment rate at 14.7%, with 20.5 million jobs lost. Thursday, Goldman Sachs published research estimating that the U.S. jobless rate would peak at 25%, as “more workers will lose their jobs and a larger share of them will be classified as unemployed,” Bloomberg reported.
The state will release its estimate of the official unemployment rate Friday, May 22.
This story was originally published May 14, 2020 at 8:52 AM.
