COVID-19 pandemic

Impact on individuals Employment effects See also: Economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and Racial disparities in the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States Government statistics US non-farm payrolls, 2005 – January 2022 In the February 2020 jobs report, which reflected the employment situation before lockdowns began, 1.28 million Americans were classed as "permanent job losers". In August, that number was at 3.41 million, and in September it rose to 3.75 million. "Temporary layoffs", meanwhile, decreased, suggesting that some job losses originally understood as "temporary" had now become permanent.[17] On May 8, 2020, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that 20.5 million nonfarm jobs were lost and the unemployment rate rose to 14.7 percent in April.[18] This followed reports of weekly initial claims for unemployment insurance that increased from a typical level of around 200,000 per week through early March, to 3.3 million the week of March 21, a peak of 6.9 million (March 28), and declines each week thereafter to 3.0 million the week of May 9. A total of 36.5 million filed for unemployment insurance from March 21 to May 9.[19] The Congressional Budget Office estimated that costs for unemployment insurance claims were $49 billion in April 2020, versus $3 billion in April 2019. An estimated $27 billion of the increase was due to the $600/week increase in unemployment benefits due to the CARES Act.[20] On May 20, 2021, the Labor Department reported that there had been only 444,000 unemployment claims during the previous week, the lowest number since the beginning of the pandemic.[21] The United States depended on direct payments and loans to help individuals and businesses, regardless of whether jobs were retained. As a result, while aggregate hours worked decreased by around 15% in the United States and the European Union, unemployment increased significantly in the United States. However, in the United States, most firms that implemented digital technol