A press release from Washington State Employment Security Office.
During the week of August 22 to 28, there were 5,073 initial regular unemployment claims, down 5.3 percent from the prior week. Total claims filed by Washingtonians for all unemployment benefit categories numbered 272,845, down 1.0 percent from the prior week.
- Initial regular claims applications are 72 percent below weekly new claims applications for the same period last year during the pandemic.
- The 4-week moving average for regular initial claims was 5,345, an increase of 39 from the previous week’s 4-week moving average. During the same time in 2019, it was 5,024.
- Decreases in layoffs in health care and social assistance, wholesale trade and retail trade contributed to a decrease of 284 regular initial claims over the previous week.
- There was a decrease in the combined total of initial claims and continued or ongoing claims for all benefits—which include regular unemployment insurance, Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) and Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC).
- Federal pandemic benefits programs, including PUA and PEUC as well as the additional $300 per week, are set to expire the week ending Sept. 4, 2021. Learn more at esd.wa.gov/covid-19.
In the week ending August 28, ESD paid out over $161 million for 198,030 individual claims. Since the crisis began in March 2020, ESD has paid more than $21 billion in benefits to over 1.1 million Washingtonians.
| Unemployment claim type | Aug. 22-28 | Aug. 15-21 | Aug. 8-14 |
| Regular Unemployment Insurance (UI) initial claims | 5,073 | 5,357 | 5,528 |
| Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) initial claims | 1,503 | 1,369 | 1,509 |
| Pandemic Emergency Unemployment Compensation (PEUC) initial claims | 617 | 534 | 427 |
| Continued or ongoing weekly claims | 265,652 | 268,118 | 277,986 |
| Total claims | 272,845 | 275,558 | 285,450 |
Note: You can find detailed claims data anytime on the ESD website.
