SC DEW: Decrease in initial unemployment insurance claims last week
(Courtesy: SC DEW/Facebook)
SOUTH CAROLINA (WOLO) – The South Carolina Department of Employment and Workforce reported a decrease in initial unemployment insurance claims for last week.
According to the department, during the week of January 10 – 16, there were 6,683 initial insurance claims for unemployment that were filed.
That’s a decrease of 1,952 initial claims filed from the previous week of January 3 – 9, where 8,635 claims were filed.
On their intrastate map showing initial unemployment insurance claims by counties, Greenville County had the highest number of claims in the state with 589.
According to SC DEW, since March 15, 825,538 total initial claims have been filed in the Palmetto State.
The department has paid out a total of more than $4.9 billion since March 15 in a combination of the following:
- Regular state Unemployment Insurance benefits
- Pandemic Unemployment Assistance
- Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation program
- Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation program
- Extended Benefits
The U.S. Department of Labor reported the number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits last week decreased slightly to a still high 900,000.
This is a decrease of the previous week reporting 965,000 Americans applying for unemployment benefits, the most since late August.
According to the department, 5.1 million Americans are continuing to receive state jobless benefits, down from 5.2 million in the previous week.
Officials say this suggests that while some unemployed people are finding jobs, others are probably using up their state benefits and transitioning to separate extended-benefit programs.
