NEW YORK (CNN Business) – The jobs crisis erupted during the last week of former President Donald Trump’s tenure, as 900,000 Americans applied for unemployment benefits for the first time on a seasonal basis.
This was down from the previous week’s high, in which orders rose to 926,000.
It is a good sign that they have gone down again, but “good” is relative here. Millions of Americans still need government help to make ends meet, and there haven’t been any real improvements in months.
Although US President Joe Biden’s inauguration on Wednesday spurred hopes for more government stimulus, the help cannot come fast enough for the unemployed.
In addition to the regular applications, 423,734 Americans have applied for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, which provides benefits to workers such as self-employed, the Department of Labor said. And this figure has not been adjusted for the seasonal swing.
Last week, first-time jobless claims totaled 1.4 million on an unadjusted basis.
Continuing aid requests, which count workers who applied for aid for at least two weeks, fell to 5.1 million.
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