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Government math doesn’t always add up.
The Labor Department on Thursday reported another 3.2 million unemployed workers applied for jobless benefits in early May, bringing the total during the coronavirus pandemic to 33.5 million in seven weeks.
Turns out it’s an under-count — by at least 2.5 million and probably a lot more.
States are just starting to report the number of new claims filed by people such as gig workers, freelance writers and independent contractors who previously were ineligible for benefits. An emergency-relief law passed by Congress last month loosened eligibility standards and allowed these workers to qualify for benefits for the very first time.
Read: Expanded unemployment benefits: Who qualifies, how to apply
The states aren’t bundling these newly eligible applicants into their overall totals of new claims, however. They have put them in a different category that is reported separately.
Consider the most recent week ended May 2. The Labor Department said initial jobless claims filed through normal state guidelines totaled 3.2 million. Yet they reported that an additional 583,699 people applied through the so-called Pandemic Unemployment Assistance Program set up by the federal government.
Read: Pandemic eliminated all the 23 million jobs created after Great Recession
Therefore: Nearly 3.8 million new claims were filed last week. Not 3.2 million.
Why doesn’t the Labor Department combine the two numbers?
Read:The U.S. economy may already have clawed back 5 million jobs
For one thing, the 3.2 million figure is seasonally adjusted as has been the norm for decades. The 583,699 is not because, well, there was no coronavirus epidemic last year and no emergency relief program.
It gets worse. Only 23 states reported the number of PUA claims last week and even fewer in the prior three weeks. They continue to lag behind in processing, reporting and paying out claims.
So the damage to the labor market is even worse than it looks, right? Well, yes and no.
While the government has reported 33.5 million new claims in the past seven weeks, the actual number of applications is somewhat lower at 30.7 million. That is, before seasonal adjustments.
Yet once all the states start to report the true number of new jobless claims — both traditional and newly eligible filers — the pool of unemployed will expand beyond what the government is now reporting.
What we know for sure is this: At least 30 million people have applied for benefits during the pandemic, but it’s probably more like 35 million and still going up.
