Delaware reported more than 13,000 additonal jobless claims during the previous week, the U.S. Department of Labor reported today.
The increase, triggered by efforts to limit the spread of the coronavirus in Delaware, is lower than the 18,851 initial claims reported during the previous week.
Still, the two weeks of new claims alone are the equivalent to a 6.7 percent Delaware unemployment, rate. This estimate does not include seasonal adjustments. Delaware’s February unemployment rate was 3.9 percent.
The combined figures suggest Delaware’s jobless rate may be in the 10 percent range, a figure, above the eight and a half-percent percent figure posted during the previous recession and slow recovery.
Nationwide the advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate was 8.2 percent for the week ending April 4, an increase of 3.1 percentage points from the previous week’s unrevised rate.
In the week ending April 11, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 5,245,000 nationwide, a decrease of 1,370,000 from the previous week’s revised level.
At a press briefing on Tuesday, Gov. John Carney acknowledged that the Delaware Department of Labor has been struggling to keep up with the flood of applications.
Especially hard hit is the hospitality industry as restaurants, hotels and state’s three casinos were shut down. The industry had been seeing more rapid job growth than other sectors of the economy.
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