Unemployment in Connecticut During COVID-19 Crisis

 

Since the beginning of the pandemic, 512,000 Connecticut residents applied for unemployment benefits.

2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020 0 10,000 20,000 30,000 40,000 50,000 60,000 70,000 80,000 Weekly Initial Claims for Unemployment Benefits in Conn. 512,082 claims were made during 21 weeks, from 03/15 to 08/02. Data by CT Department of Labor (preliminary after 07/12), chart by CTData Collaborative. 03/15: 78,592 03/22: 71,449 03/29: 59,929 04/05: 40,943 04/12: 27,824 04/19: 20,557 04/26: 27,838 05/03: 20,919 05/10: 17,626 05/17: 15,906 One-time addition of newly eligible PUA claims
 

Where in Connecticut are people applying?

In absolute terms, it is not surprising that big Connecticut cities see the largest number of initial claims. The most claims were made in:

  • Bridgeport—22,448

  • Hartford—19,911

  • Waterbury—17,237

  • Stamford—17,170

  • New Haven—16,230

The picture changes significantly when looking at per-capita rates. New London (185 per 1,000), Norwich (234) and Canaan (288) saw much higher application rates than New Haven (124), Stamford (133), Bridgeport (153), or Hartford (161).

The map below shows the number of initials claims made during 21 weeks, from 03/15 to 08/02 by town per 1,000 residents.

The top-20 towns with the most claims per 1,000 residents are labeled. You can see that of 20 most affected towns per capita, 8 are in New London County. Click the map to enlarge.

Click to enlarge. Initial UI claims per 1,000 residents during 21 weeks of COVID-19 crisis (03/15 to 08/02). Data by CT Department of Labor (incomplete after 07/12), population data by ACS 2018 5-year estimates, map by CTData Collaborative.

What is this data?

The Connecticut Department of Labor’s (DOL) Initial Claims data is an important resource to understand the economic impact of the COVID-19 crisis on the state of Connecticut.

Initial claims are applications for unemployment benefits, which may or may not result in an applicant receiving them. People who aren’t covered by the Unemployment program include federal workers, railroad & religious workers, and self-employed, although they might be able to access benefits through the Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (PUA) scheme.

Due to a reduced capacity of the department to process claims, as well as an unprecedented surge in the number of applications (initial claims), the complete (non-preliminary) data released by the DoL is lagging by about a month. As of August 13, 2020, the latest non-preliminary data we have is for the week of 07/12.

 

Accommodation and food services, arts & entertainment, and the Self-Employed are hit hardest

 
0 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% Proportion of Total Industry Employment (Feb 2020) Self Employed Accommodation & Food Services Arts, Ent., & Recreation Other Services Educational Services Retail Trade Admin. & Support Svces. Transp. & Warehousing Wholesale Trade Health Care & Soc Assistance Construction Manufacturing Real Estate Information Prof. & Tech. Services Management of Companies Finance & Insurance Utilities Public Administration Self Employed Industry Hit Hardest by Covid-19 Unemployment Percentage and count of initial unemployment benefit claims during 21 weeks (03/15 to 08/02) by total employment in the industry (as of February 2020) 81.6% 85,264 claims 53.2% 66,389 50.9% 11,461 39.7% 25,339 36.8% 27,065 33.1% 55,888 27.7% 23,743 26.2% 14,630 21.6% 12,586 21.5% 58,910 21.3% 11,755 19.5% 31,481 17.5% 3,639 13.7% 4,306 13.3% 12,871 (8.8%) 2,973 (4.1%) 4,243 (2.9%) 150 (2.4%) 5,785 85,264 claimers represent 81.6% of total industry employment in Feb 2020 Data by Department of Labor (preliminary after 07/12), self-employed estimates are 2018 ACS. Construction includes Mining. Chart by CTData Collaborative. www.ctdata.org

How did we calculate these numbers?

We used DOL’s industry employment counts for February 2020 (the latest full month not affected by COVID-19) to calculate the percentage of employees by industry who applied for unemployment benefits. The bar chart shows both percentage (x-axis, represents how much each industry was impacted) and number of workers who applied for unemployment benefits (labels).

 

Women and lower-income workers apply more often

Nationwide, women are more affected by layoffs than men. The chart below shows that the same is true for Connecticut.

03/01 03/08 03/15 03/22 03/29 04/05 04/12 04/19 04/26 05/03 05/10 05/17 05/24 05/31 06/07 06/14 06/21 06/28 07/05 07/12 07/19 07/26 08/02 0 10,000 20,000 30,000 40,000 50,000 First-Time Claimers by Gender, by Week since March 1, 2020 www.ctdata.org Before Covid-19, men were more likely to apply for unemployment benefits than women. In the week of 03/15, 63.8% of first-time claimers were women. One-time addition of newly eligible PUA claims Data: Initial claims, CT Department of Labor (preliminary after 07/12) Chart by CTData Collaborative Gender Female Male

Nearly half of first-time claimers declared either no earnings, or earnings below $20,000 in 12 months prior to claim.

Zero Under $20k $20-35k $35-50k $50-75k $75–150k $150k+ Previous Year Wages 0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 % 11.4% 50,334 38.0% 167,392 19.2% 84,600 12.6% 55,353 10.7% 47,241 6.7% 29,457 5,801 www.ctdata.org Source: Initial Claims data by CT Department of Labor, weeks 03/15 to 08/02 (preliminary after 07/12) 38% of claims were made by those who earned between $1–$20,000 in 12 months prior to claim
 

Which Demographic Groups are Impacted the Most?

 

We looked at UI applicants’ age, race, and education to understand which subgroups got impacted the most. We divided the number of claims in each subgroup by the respective labor force size to calculate what percentage of that demographics got impacted. Conclusion: the young, the ones with fewer years of education, and workers of color were more likely to apply for UI benefits.

We used 2018 ACS 1-year data for Connecticut to estimate % of labor force that got impacted.

 

Just under a third of those aged 20-29 in the labor force applied for UI benefits

People in the middle of their career, aged 40–60, were less likely to lose jobs than those at the beginning or the end of their careers.

0 20 40 60 80 100 % 70 to 79 60 to 69 50 to 59 40 to 49 30 to 39 20 to 29 Under 20 Age Group 33.1% (17,179) 26.7% (65,721) 22.8% (96,984) 22.0% (85,030) 27.1% (99,532) 31.7% (118,483) 28.5% (21,992 claims) www.ctdata.org Source: Initial Claims data by CT Department of Labor, weeks 03/15 to 08/02 (preliminary after 07/12)

Workers of color are worse off than white workers.

30.3% of Black workers claimed benefits, compared to 20.7% of white workers.

0 20 40 60 80 100 % White Asian / Pacific Hispanic Black Native American Race 20.7% (305,744) 26.1% (24,398) 27.0% (81,731) 30.3% (63,559) 42.5% (1,766 claims) www.ctdata.org Source: Initial Claims data by CT Department of Labor, weeks 03/15 to 08/02 (preliminary after 07/12)

A worker with a high school diploma was twice more likely to apply for UI benefits than a worker with a Bachelor’s degree*.

Workers with more years of education were less likely to apply for UI benefits.

*Note: Education data is not available for 40.3% of first-time claimers for the 21-week period.

0 20 40 60 80 100 % More than Bachelor's Bachelor's Some College High School Grad Less than High School Education 8.4% (28,472) 10.9% (49,880) 15.9% (66,166) 21.8% (130,630) 25.7% (30,564 claims) www.ctdata.org Source: Initial Claims data by CT Department of Labor, weeks 03/15 to 08/02 (preliminary after 07/12)
 

Data

We will monitor new releases of Initial Claims data by DOL and update this page. Charts and the map are created in Python (with matplotlib, Seaborn, and geopandas).