FOX Business, Edward Lawrence, breaks down the December job report.
The number of Americans filing unemployment benefits for the first time continued to increase last week due to an increase in COVID-19 infections and new restrictions to limit the spread of the virus, which weighs on the recovery of the labor market.
Figures released by the Department of Labor on Thursday show that 900,000 Americans first filed unemployment claims in the week ended January 16, slightly below the 910,000 forecasts of Refinitiv economists.
The number is almost four times the level before the crisis, but it is far below the peak of almost 7 million reached when stay-at-home orders were first issued in March. Nearly 70 million Americans, or about 40% of the workforce, applied for unemployment benefits during the pandemic.
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The number of people still receiving unemployment benefits dropped to 5,054 million, a decrease of about 127,000 compared to the previous week. The report shows that by January 2, about 15.99 million Americans received some form of unemployment benefit.
Many more Americans are receiving unemployment benefits from two federal programs that Congress drafted in March with the adoption of the CARES law: one supporting self-employed individuals, gig workers, and others who are not usually eligible to receive benefits, and the others provide assistance to those who have exhausted their state benefits.
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“The current wave of the pandemic does not appear to be weakening yet and the prospect of new, more transferable variants increases the risk of a prolonged third wave,” said Daniel Zhao, senior economist at Glassdoor. “While the vaccine provides a light at the end of the tunnel, we are still far from a complete reopening of the economy that could cause the recovery and hinder further redundancies.”
The federal government renewed those programs in late December with the enactment of a $ 900 billion emergency lending law, which provides a supplemental unemployment benefit of $ 300 a week, a one-time $ 600 stimulus test for most adults and new funding for a small business includes. rescue program.
The top Democrats saw the emergency relief package as the tip of the iceberg, and President Biden, who was inaugurated on Wednesday, identified a $ 1.9 billion stimulus plan that includes $ 20 billion for vaccine distribution, extended unemployment benefits at $ 400 per week until September and a third stimulus test worth $ 1,400.