Iowa reports fewest new unemployment claims since start of COVID-19 pandemic

Iowa had the fewest new unemployment claims in the week ending April 24 since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to data released Thursday by Iowa Workforce Development.

New claims fell from 6,981 to 3,893, about a 43 percent decrease. Continuing claims also decreased, albeit more gradually, from 32,950 to 31,149.

The decline in new claims of more than 3,000 came a week after new claims increased by almost 2,000. New claim numbers have fluctuated for the past five weeks between increasing and decreasing.

About 49.3 percent of claims were related to COVID-19, according to the Iowa Workforce Development, which was down from about 58.5 percent in the previous week.

Manufacturing was the largest source of claims with 651, followed by self-employed and independent contractors with 617, health care and social assistance with 317, retail trade with 306 and construction with 263.

The claims resulted in $17 million in Federal Pandemic Unemployment Compensation, $8.7 million in standard unemployment benefits, $7.9 million in Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation and $2.8 million in Pandemic Unemployment Assistance.

Due to high call volumes, IWD encouraged those unemployed in a news release to “call only if they need assistance filing their claims.”

These numbers are preliminary and are yet to be adjusted by the U.S. Department of Labor. They also only include people actively seeking work and therefore do not necessarily give a full picture of how many people are out of work.

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