Initial regular unemployment benefit claims increased while continued claims decreased during week of August 30-September 5

OLYMPIA – During the week of August 30 through September 5, there were 20,006 initial regular unemployment claims (up 10.1 percent from the prior week) and 531,425 total claims for all unemployment benefit categories (down 6.5 percent from the prior week) filed by Washingtonians, according to the Employment Security Department (ESD).

Initial regular claims applications remain at elevated levels and are at 299 percent above last year’s weekly new claims applications.

Regular continuing claims decreased over the previous week while initial claims applications for Regular Unemployment Insurance, Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC) and Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) all increased over the week.

ESD paid out over $177.7 million for 356,680 individual claims – a decrease of $1.2 million and 609 less individuals compared to the prior week.

For more information on current claimants and claims processing progress, please go to the benefits data dashboard on the ESD website.

Below is a twenty-seven week summary of statewide initial claims filed since the start of the COVID-19 crisis:

Weekly data breakdown

By industry

Industry sectors experiencing the highest number of initial claims during August 30- September 5 were:

Educational services: 2,601 initial regular claims, up 932 (+56 percent) from previous week
Accommodation and food services: 2,005 initial regular claims, up 40 (+2 percent) from previous week
Construction: 1,790 initial regular claims, up 160 (+10 percent) from the previous week
Health care and social assistance: 1,740 initial regular claims, up 63 (+4 percent) from the previous week
Manufacturing: 1,681 regular initial claims, up 307 (+22 percent) from the previous week

By occupation

Management occupations: 2,265 regular initial claims, up 242 (+12 percent) from the previous week
Construction and extraction occupations: 2,077 regular initial claims, up 157 (+8 percent) from the previous week
Food preparation and serving: 2,072 regular initial claims, down 46 (-2 percent) from previous week
Transportation and material moving occupations: 2,012 regular initial claims, up 462 (+30 percent) from previous week
Office and administrative support occupations: 1,687 regular initial claims, up 86 (+5 percent) from the previous week

By county

King County, the most populous county in the state, saw initial regular claims increase from 4,763 to 5,461 during the week of August 30 – September 5, up 15 percent from the week before.

Other counties with the largest number of initial claims during the week were:

Pierce County: Initial regular claims filed increased from 2,443 to 2,509 up 3 percent from the week before.
Snohomish County: Initial regular claims filed increased from 1,911 to 2,391 up 25 percent from the week before.
Spokane County: Initial regular claims filed increased from 1,040 to 1,076 up 3 percent from the week before.
Clark County: Initial regular claims filed increased from 867 to 978 up 13 percent from the week before.

SharedWork

For employers looking to avoid layoffs or slowly ramp up re-hiring during this crisis, SharedWork is a great program that can help. You can learn more at esd.wa.gov/SharedWork