Another 6.6 Million Americans File for Unemployment, Bringing Total to 17 Million

Another 6.6 million Americans filed for unemployment last week, virtually duplicating the number of new claims filed the week before. The latest figures for the week ending April 4 bring the total of U.S. unemployment claims since the coronavirus pandemic began roughly three weeks ago to nearly 17 million. 3.3 million people filed unemployment claims for the week ending March 21–shattering the record set in 1982 of 695,000 claims–and then for the week ending March 28, that figure astonishingly doubled to 6.6 million claims.

Says Darrell Cronk, chief investment officer of Wells Fargo Wealth and Investment Management, “So far, jobless claims look to me like the only limitation on the number of applications has been the states’ ability to process those claims.”