COLUMBUS – While the number of first-time claims for unemployment benefits inched back upward last week from a pandemic-era low, the number of overall claims continued to decline, indicating the state’s economy is still in recovery mode.
Ohioans filed 7,375 initial traditional unemployment claims last week, which was 0.05% more than the previous week while the 40,050 continuing claims dropped by about the same amount, according to data the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services provided to the U.S. Department of Labor Thursday.
The total number of claims filed during the week of Oct. 24-30 was 0.04% lower than the previous week and was 19% below the number at the end of September when the unemployment rate was 5.4%.
The number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits fell to a fresh pandemic low of 269,000 last week, another sign the job market is healing after last year’s coronavirus recession.
Overall, 2.1 million Americans were collecting unemployment checks the week of Oct. 23 — down from 7.1 million a year earlier.