Jobless claims plunge in California and nation

Unemployment claims in California plunged to their lowest level in three months.

Workers across the state filed 69,900 initial claims for jobless benefits during the week ending April 10, a sharp drop of 75,600 from 145,500 claims filed the prior week, the U.S. Labor Department reported Thursday.

The improvement arrived at the same time as a new blunder surfaced, showing the state labor agency blocked payments to nearly 200,000 unemployed California workers.

In the weekly claims report, the number of claims filed last week is the lowest in nearly three months.

During the week ending Jan. 23, California workers filed 53,300 unemployment claims.

Nationwide, workers filed 576,000 initial claims for unemployment during the week ending April 10, a decrease of 193,000 from 769,000 jobless claims the previous week, Labor Department data shows.

Separately, however, the state Employment Development Department disclosed in a tweet that 178,000 workers were blocked from reapplying for jobless benefits because of a glitch on its website.

“The EDD has notified about 178,000 customers of an issue temporarily preventing them from reapplying for benefits after reaching the end of their initial benefit year,” the EDD said in its tweet.

The state agency said it was working to remedy the problem.

“We apologize for the inconvenience and will have this fixed by Friday,” the EDD tweeted.

Across the U.S., 132,000 filed for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, a federal program that covers freelancers, part-timers and others who do not routinely qualify for state benefits. That was a decline of 20,000 from the previous week.

Neither figure is seasonally adjusted. On a seasonally adjusted basis, new state claims totaled 576,000.

“We’re gaining momentum here, which is just unquestionable,” said Diane

Swonk, chief economist at the accounting firm Grant Thornton.

But she cautioned that the jobless claims levels, while good news, were still extraordinarily high compared to what they were before the pandemic.

“You’re still not popping Champagne corks,” she said. “I will breath again — and breath easy again — once we get these numbers back down in the 200,000 range.”

In addition, 132,000 filed for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, a federal program that covers freelancers, part-timers and others who do not routinely qualify for state benefits. That was a decline of 20,000 from the previous week.

Neither figure is seasonally adjusted.

On a seasonally adjusted basis, new state claims totaled 576,000.