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 April 18 – 24, there were 3,037 initial insurance claims for unemployment that were filed.
This is a decrease of 1,884 initial claims filed from the previous week of April 11 – 17, where 4,921 claims were filed.
On their intrastate map showing initial unemployment insurance claims by counties, Greenville had the highest number of claims in the state with 322.
According to the department, since March 15, 2020, 886,256 total initial unemployment insurance claims have been filed in the Palmetto State.
The department has paid out a total of more than $5.9 billion since March 15 of last year 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
- Lost Wages Assistance program
The U.S. Department of Labor says the number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits dropped by 13,000 last week to 553,000, the lowest level since the pandemic hit last March.
Officials say this is another sign that the economy is recovering from the pandemic.
According to the department, on the week of April 17, close to 3.7 million people were receiving traditional state unemployment benefits.
