RICHMOND—The Virginia Employment Commission (VEC) announced that the number of initial claims filed rose slightly during the most recent filing week.

For the filing week ending October 2, the figure for seasonally unadjusted initial claims in Virginia was 9,360. The latest claims figure was an increase of 643 claimants from the previous week.

For the most recent filing week, continued weeks claimed totaled 44,019, which was a decrease of 3,222 claims from the previous week and 73% lower than the 160,764 continued claims from the comparable week last year. Over half of claims that had a self-reported industry were in the health care and social assistance, retail trade, administrative and waste services, accommodation and food services industries, and professional and technical services. The continued claims total is mainly comprised of those recent initial claimants who continued to file for unemployment insurance benefits during the COVID-19 pandemic.

For additional information on who is claiming unemployment insurance in Virginia, access the VEC’s U.I. claims data dashboard (https://www.vec.virginia.gov/ui-claims-dashboard) that is updated no later than the following Monday after the weekly claims press release.

Nationwide, in the week ending October 2, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 326,000, a decrease of 38,000 from the previous week's revised level. The previous week's level was revised up by 2,000 from 362,000 to 364,000. The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 258,909 in the week ending October 2, a decrease of 41,431 (or -13.8 percent) from the previous week. There were 723,981 initial claims in the comparable week in 2020. Looking at preliminary data, more states reported decreases on a seasonally unadjusted basis. California’s preliminary weekly change (-10,513) was the largest decrease. The District of Columbia’s preliminary weekly change (-3,951) was the second largest decrease. Michigan’s preliminary weekly change (-3,247) was the third largest decrease. Texas’s was the fourth largest decrease (-3,099). Missouri’s decrease (-2,851) was the fifth largest weekly decrease. Virginia’s preliminary weekly change (+1,031) was the second largest increase.