New jobless claims down in Florida

The first unemployment claims report of the new year saw a slight dip in the number of new unemployment claims filed in Florida, even as COVID-19 cases rose to new levels.

Floridians filed 21,441 new claims for the week ending Jan. 2, according to weekly data released Thursday by the U.S. Department of Labor.

That’s down from 26,533 new claims the week prior. Nationally, the figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 787,000, a decrease of 3,000 from the previous week’s revised level.

Florida’s unemployment rate in November sat at 6.4% — that’s about 651,100 workers. Figures for December will be released later this month.

While the state’s unrestricted business policies have benefited the economy, they also has been blamed for increasing the risk of virus spread. Wednesday, Florida’s COVID-case count hit a new record of 17,783 in a single day, the third highest in the country.

In a report released last week, the state’s Office of Economic and Demographic Research noted that the unemployment rate shot up to 13.8% in April 2020, surpassing the prior peak rate of 11.3% experienced in January 2010 during the Great Recession. That spike came after a historic low of 2.8% unemployment in January and February of last year.

“The change was breathtaking,” the report said. “Over the space of two months, the unemployment rate shifted from a near 50-year low to a near 50-year high.”

This story was originally published January 7, 2021 at 9:04 AM.