New jobless claims totaled 4.4M last week, topping 25M over past five weeks
by Jay Heflin
| April 23, 2020 08:31 AM
The number of workers claiming new unemployment benefits was 4.4 million last week, the Labor Department reported Thursday, as the economy remains essentially shut down because of the coronavirus.
Economists had projected about 4.5 million new claims. Morgan Stanley predicted claims would total 3.8 million and that the unemployment rate for April would be 15%.
Over 25 million people have lost their job in the last five weeks, the jobless claims numbers show.
The previous week, 5.2 million workers filed jobless claims. Economists estimated that the historically high number of jobless claims probably peaked in the week ending March 28, when 6.8 million workers claimed unemployment benefits. Jobless claims for the week ending April 4 were 6.6 million.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/new-jobless-claims-totaled-4-4-million-last-week-topping-25-million-over-past-five-weeks
