California jobless claims rise again as US numbers fall – Press Enterprise

California workers filed more first-time jobless claims last week than the week before, raising questions about whether the state’s job market is recovering from COVID-related conditions.

In the week ending July 31, California workers filed 65,500 claims for unemployment benefits, 1,000 more than in the week ending July 24, the U.S. Department of Labor reported Thursday.

California produced one-fifth of all unemployment claims filed in the United States last week.

California employers and the personnel boards that supply workers to employers are reporting no rise in job applications even as schools begin to reopen and as the Sept. 4 cutoff for unemployment benefits approaches, said Michael Bernick, a labor attorney at law firm Duane. Morris and a former EDD director.

Nationwide, workers filed 385,000 first-time unemployment claims last week, down 14,000 from the first claims the week before, the Labor Department reported. These figures have been adjusted to take into account seasonal volatility.

Unemployment claims filed in California last week accounted for 20.2% of all claims nationwide, even though the state only employs 11.8% of workers in the U.S.

The unemployment claims filed in California represent the highest weekly number since the state reopened its economy in mid-June.

Economists had predicted that reopening the economy would allow the state-wide job market to gain traction, but instead, California claims have soared to their highest level since June 12, which was just days before the state reopening. In that week, an estimated 68,000 first-time unemployment applications were filed.

It seems that a significant number of unemployed California workers are left on the sidelines, not rushing to find new jobs.

Statewide job openings for the week of July 30 were 2.8% lower than job openings for January 2020, the website Track the Recovery reports.

Nationally, job openings were 4.9% higher than January 2020 levels, according to Track the Recovery.

A resurgence in matters related to the highly contagious delta variant has also clouded the economic outlook. And the claims remain historically high: Before the pandemic swept through the economy in March 2020, the weekly rate was around 220,000 per week.

The labor market is recovering strongly since the pandemic crippled economic activity last year and employers cut more than 22 million jobs in March and April 2020. Since then, the United States has restored 16.7 million jobs. And employers have added a rising number of jobs for three straight months, including a hefty 943,000 in July. They posted a record 10.1 million job openings in June, faster than applicants are lining up to fill them.

Including federal programs, 12 million people received some type of unemployment benefits the week of August 7, up from 27.5 million a year earlier.