Unemployment claims fell in California in the most recent week, federal officials reported Thursday, as the statewide economy battled to rebound from the effects of the coronavirus and businesses began to slowly re-open for customers.
Initial jobless claims in California totaled 243,300 during the week that ended June 13, down 12,500 from the 255,800 first-time unemployment claims the prior week.
A jaw-dropping 5.43 million California workers have filed first-time claims for unemployment benefits, a grim milestone reached almost exactly three months since state and local government officials began to impose business shutdowns to combat the deadly bug.
Nationwide, workers filed about 1.51 million initial unemployment claims during the week that ended June 13, down 58,000 from the 1.57 million workers who filed first-time claims in the week ending on June 6, the U.S. Labor Department reported Thursday.
About 46 million workers in the United States have filed initial claims for unemployment benefits in the three months since the government-mandated business shutdowns began.
In California, the four-week moving average for jobless claims improved by falling, this news organization’s compilation of the government’s statistics shows.
Over the four weeks that ended on June 13, initial unemployment claims averaged 232,800, which was down slightly from the 233,000 weekly average for the four weeks that ended on June 6.
