Justin Bullock, FISM News
The most recent weekly unemployment claims increased last week despite the growing desperation by employers for new employees. Approximately 419,000 new individuals filed for unemployment insurance for the week ending on July 17, which sits at almost 100,000 claims higher than the week’s estimate. In the meantime, employers, especially in the service and retail industries, are becoming increasingly desperate for employees as they hope to re-open and increase business.
Experts have said that this phenomenon is deeply complex given the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. It is evident that the pandemic stimulus measures that boosted unemployment pay and benefits have significantly disincentivized potential workers from entering the work force. Many workers receive more income while unemployed than they would if they were working. The majority of unemployment benefits have either just expired or are set to expire by September 1, 2021, so economists expect that once those expirations are felt by Americans the labor market will see a recovery.
In addition, with the growing emergence of the Delta variant of the COVID-19 virus, Americans are becoming increasingly suspicious that another nationwide lock down could be coming. This has the potential to further disincentivize potential workers from getting jobs as some may fear contracting the virus by entering the work force or that they will quickly lose those jobs after another shutdown and have to re-apply for unemployment. In any case the situation right now is incredibly perplexing for economists and becoming increasingly dire for employers.