CHICAGO (NewsNation Now) — The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits last week fell again to a still historically high 847,000, a sign that layoffs keep coming as the coronavirus pandemic continues to rage.
The latest report released by the Labor Department Thursday shows that the number of people filing for jobless benefits decreased 67,000. The previous week showed a decrease in people as well.
The number of Americans receiving traditional unemployment benefits also decreased to nearly 4.8 million, a decrease of 203,000. That is down from a staggering peak of nearly 25 million in May when the virus — and lockdowns and other measures to contain it — brought economic activity to a near halt. The drop suggests that some of the unemployed are finding new jobs and that others have exhausted state benefits.
“Individuals who are currently unemployed may face prolonged joblessness, while those who are just hanging onto their positions may yet be jobless before the pandemic eases more substantially and the economy begins to heal,” said Mark Hamrick, senior analyst at Bankrate.
Before the virus hit the United States hard last March, weekly applications for jobless aid had never topped 700,000.
“The economy is facing a number of risks in the next few weeks and months, between the slow rollout of COVID-19 vaccines and uncertainty surrounding another round of economic relief legislation,” said Hamrick. “The damage to personal finances and employment is on top of the heartbreaking mounting causality toll from the disease itself.”
Since February, the United States has lost 9.8 million jobs, including 140,000 in December.
The United States is now recording around 150,000 new coronavirus cases a day, according to data complied by Johns Hopkins University. That is down from nearly 250,000 a day at the beginning of January but still more than twice the levels seen from March 2020 until an increase in cases in late October. So far, more than 425,000 Americans have died from the pandemic.