Layoffs in the US remain stubbornly high as jobs market struggles

Job seekers exercise social distancing as they wait to be called into the Heartland Workforce Solutions office in Omaha, Nebraska [File: Nati Harnik/AP) [The Associated Press]

As jobless claims hold above 1m for 17th straight week, US voters digest Biden and Trump plans for creating jobs.

With less than four months to go before United States voters go to the polls to elect their next president, a rapid rebound from the economic ravages of coronavirus is looking increasingly unlikely for the world's largest economy.

Some 1.3 million Americans filed for state unemployment benefits last week, the US Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Thursday - marking the 17th consecutive week that jobless claims have held above 1 million.

Factor in the number of Americans filing for federal jobless benefits last week, and the total climbs to 2.4 million.

The stubbornly high number signals that layoffs remain widespread as states and cities across the country wrestle with a spike in infections. In Florida - where confirmed cases of COVID-19 have dramatically increased - jobless claims for the week ending July 11 soared to 129,408, more than double the previous week's number.

"The risk may be for additional layoffs going forward as some states reimpose more restrictive measures to combat surging COVID-19 cases," Oxford Economics Lead US Economist Nancy Vanden Houten wrote in a note to clients.

All told, some 32 million Americans are collecting unemployment benefits from state and federal programmes. But the flow of funds from Washington to America's millions of unemployed workers is set to taper considerably.


The federal government's $600 weekly top-up to state unemployment benefits is due to expire next week.

"The millions who will remain jobless after the extra $600 is cut off will have no choice but to drastically cut their spending, causing a sharp decline in their living standards," Heidi Shierholz, senior economist at the progressive-leaning Economic Policy Institute think-tank wrote in a blog post on Thursday.

The latest figures come as voters were given starkly different plans for jump-starting the US economy and jobs engine through big infrastructure projects.

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced major changes to an existing law that will dramatically accelerate the timeline for environmental and health impact reviews of proposed infrastructure projects like pipelines, oil wells and highways.

Rolling back regulations has been a signature policy of Trump's since he took office. The president and other free-market conservatives believe that bureaucratic red tape designed to limit negative impacts on people and the planet are onerous, and act as a drag on economic growth and jobs creation.

On Tuesday, Biden unveiled his own plan for upgrading infrastructure that also promised to tackle climate change and redress environmental injustice by pledging to invest $2 trillion over his first-four year term in office to promote a clean energy economy that aims to create millions of well-paying, union jobs.


SOURCE: AL JAZEERA NEWS