More than 6.65 million people filed new unemployment claims in the week ending March 28. This doubled the record set the previous week of 3.3 million claims. The record before that was 695,000 in seasonally adjusted terms, from 1982.
The number of jobless claims made in a week has increased by 23.5 percent from the report on March 14, when there were 282,000 claims made.
When unemployment claims jumped by the record-shattering 3.3 million in the week ending March 21, Secretary of Labor Eugene Scalia said, “the increase in unemployment claims was not unexpected, and results from the recognition by Americans across the country that we have had to temporarily halt certain activities in order to defeat the coronavirus.”
After the 6.6 million jump, Scalia said: “Similar to last week’s unemployment claims numbers, today’s report reflects the sacrifices American workers are making for their families, neighbors, and country in order to ‘slow the spread.’ The administration continues to act quickly to address this impact on American workers.”
On April 1, the Labor Department adopted a rule to immediately implement paid sick leave and expanded family and medical leave provisions of the Family First Coronavirus Response Act. The FFCRA reimburses private employers with fewer than 500 employees with tax credits for the cost of providing employees with paid leave for reasons related to COVID-19.