by Timothy McQuiston, Vermont Business Magazine Today, the Vermont Department of Labor reported today that the state's unemployment rate for March was 3.2 percent. This does not account for most of the job losses associated with the COVID-19 and Governor Scott's "Stay Home, Stay Safe" emergency order. Over 78,000 Vermonters have filed unemployment claims. The March rate reflects an increase of eight-tenths of a percent from the prior month’s estimate of 2.4 percent. The US unemployment rate increased from 3.5 percent to 4.4 percent in March.
Michael Harrington, Acting Labor Commissioner, said: “The March data in this report primarily reflects activity during the week of March 8th through March 14th. The Governor declared a State of Emergency on March 13th. As such, the economic impact of COVID-19 is only partially reflected in this report. The March data captures the early effects on unemployment with both the number of unemployed and the unemployment rate rising sharply. These increases are dwarfed by the elevated levels of unemployment insurance claims we have seen since mid-March. It is anticipated the monthly press release for April will look much different and should be more consistent with the significant economic disruption we are all experiencing. The Department is adding staff and leveraging technology to assist those impacted by COVID-19.”
On Thursday, the Vermont Department of Labor distributed its weekly report on the Unemployment Insurance claims through the division of Economic and Labor Market Information.
The report indicated that for the week ending April 11, 2020, the Department processed 9,662 Initial Claims and 31,204 Continued Claims. In comparison to last year, this is an increase of 8,964 Initial Claims, and 25,823 Continued Claims for the same week. The April 16, 2020 report can be found at http://www.vtlmi.info/
As a supplement to this report, the Department provides the following information through its Unemployment Insurance Division:
• Number of Initial Claims Processed to date since March 15, 2020: 78,098 (a 22.8 percent unemployment rate at March's Labor Force)
• Number of Initial Claims between April 5-April 11: 13,511
• Number of Initial Claims for same week in 2019 (week ending April 13, 2019): 698
Please note that the data above provides an estimate and not an exact number of claims received by the Department during the date ranges shown.
The seasonally-adjusted Vermont data for March show the Vermont civilian labor force increased by 2,239 from the prior month’s revised estimate. The number of employed persons decreased by 590 and the number of unemployed persons increased by 2,829. The changes to the labor force, the number of unemployed persons and the unemployment rate were statistically significant in the seasonally-adjusted series.
The March unemployment rates for Vermont’s 17 labor market areas ranged from 2.4 percent in Woodstock to 7.2 percent in Derby (note: local labor market area unemployment rates are not seasonally-adjusted). For comparison, the March unadjusted unemployment rate for Vermont was 3.4 percent, which was an increase of eight-tenths of one percentage point from the revised unadjusted February level and an increase of seven-tenths of one percentage point from a year ago.
Not-Seasonally-Adjusted
The preliminary ‘not-seasonally-adjusted’ jobs estimates for March show a decrease of 3,800 jobs when compared to the revised February numbers. There was a decrease of 100 jobs between the preliminary and the revised February estimates due to the inclusion of more data. The monthly decrease seen in the March numbers was broad-based. The overall economic trends can be detected by focusing on the over-the-year changes in this data series. As detailed in the preliminary ‘not-seasonally-adjusted’ March data, Total Private industries have decreased by 8,100 jobs (-3.1 percent) and Government (including public education) employment has increased by 1,100 jobs (1.9 percent) in the past year.
Seasonally-Adjusted
The seasonally-adjusted data for March reports a decrease of 2,900 jobs from the revised February data. As with the ‘not-seasonally-adjusted’ data, this over-the-month change is from the revised February numbers which experienced a decrease of 700 jobs from the preliminary estimates. The seasonally-adjusted over-the-month changes in March varied at the sector level. Those with a notable increase include: Federal Government (+200 jobs or +2.8%) and Financial Activities (+200 jobs or +1.7%). Sectors with a notable decrease include: Leisure and Hospitality (-900 jobs or -2.5%) and State Government (-400 jobs or -2.0%).
