Nearly 177,000 Washington residents joined the swelling ranks of the state's unemployed last week as the coronavirus pandemic continues to undercut the state economy.
For the week ending April 4, the state received 176,827 initial claims for unemployment insurance, according to figures released Thursday morning by the U.S. Department of Labor.
That brings the total number of state residents seeking jobless benefits since the pandemic began to more than half a million.
The state's new jobless claims were down 3.2% from the number reported the previous week, representing the first decline in more than a month. Nationally, new weekly unemployment claims also declined slightly, to 6.6 million, down from a revised number of 6.8 million the previous week.
But the state's modest decline may be only temporary. State employment security officials have warned that many jobless residents are likely waiting to file their claims until new federal unemployment assistance becomes available later in April.
Washington state's Employment Security Department will report its own jobless data at 10 a.m. Thursday. The number of claims reported by the state often differs slightly from Labor Department data, but typically tracks federal jobless numbers.
