The U.S. reduced unemployment to record lows last year, though it has experienced fluctuations and an overall rise since then as inflation has cooled. Most recently, the job market continued to falter, with new unemployment claims increasing by 4.3% week-over-week on March 25. There are currently 6.5 million Americans unemployed in total, and it’s important to look at some key stats for the latest week to get the complete picture:
- The following states had unemployment claims last week that were higher than in the previous week: Maine, Washington, Florida, New York, Rhode Island, California, Hawaii, Minnesota, North Dakota, Massachusetts, Kentucky, New Jersey, Illinois, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Ohio, Wisconsin, Kansas, Maryland and Iowa.
- While there was an increase in weekly claims nationally, 25 states – including Ohio, Indiana, and Georgia – and the District of Columbia had unemployment claims last week that were better than the same week last year.
To identify where unemployment claims are increasing the most, WalletHub compared the 50 states and the District of Columbia based on changes in unemployment claims for several key benchmark weeks. We also considered the number of claims per 100,000 people in the labor force.
