Jobless in city hits 18%: report

Unemployment in the Big Apple hit 18% last month, a new analysis released Friday by the City Comptroller found.

As of May, there were approximately 671,000 New Yorkers unemployed with 900,000 fewer people working in the city when compared to February, the report found.

“The latest data on the city’s unemployment situation is alarming and further underscores the urgent need for swift, robust federal support,” Comptroller Scott Stringer said.

“We need Washington to recognize the enormous scale of the losses we’ve suffered and get New York City the financial aid it needs.”

To address so many workers now being out of work, Stringer said the federal government should extend pandemic unemployment benefits of $600 a week and the city should jumpstart infrastructure projects to create jobs.

In February, before the coronavirus swept through the city, unemployment in the five boroughs stood at 3.5%. In April, during the height of the pandemic, it climbed to 15.8%.

Stringer’s analysis found that from February through May, more than 381,000 people dropped out of the city’s workforce.

The hardest-hit demographic: young people.

According to the report, the unemployment rate among people from the ages of 16 to 24 jumped to 35.2% in May from 6.6% in February.

Immigrants have also been walloped by job losses with unemployment hitting 23.3% among the city’s foreign-born population last month.