RICHMOND—The Virginia Employment Commission (VEC) announced today that the number of initial claims increased in the latest filing week to 2,487 but remained at the typical pre-Pandemic volumes experienced in 2019.

For the filing week ending July 1, the figure for seasonally unadjusted initial claims in Virginia was 2,487, which was an increase of 449 claimants from the previous week. Continued weeks claimed totaled 13,313, which was 68 claims lower than the previous week and an increase of 35.4% from the 9,834 continued claims from the comparable week last year. Ninety-three percent of claimants self-reported an associated industry, of those reported over half (58 percent) of continued claims were from professional, scientific, and technical services (1,882), administrative and support and waste management (1,863), health care and social assistance (1,243), manufacturing (1,118), and retail trade (1,034).

Eligibility for benefits is determined on a weekly basis, and so not all weekly claims filed result in a benefit payment. This is because the initial claims numbers represent claim applications; claims are then reviewed for eligibility and legitimacy. 

In the week ending July 1, the advance U.S. figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 248,000, an increase of 12,000 from the previous week's revised level. The previous week's level was revised down by 3,000 from 239,000 to 236,000. The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs[1], unadjusted, totaled 250,556 in the week ending July 1, an increase of 20,838 (or 9.1 percent) from the previous week. There were 218,886 initial claims in the comparable week in 2022. Looking at preliminary data, most U.S. states reported increases on a seasonally unadjusted basis. Michigan’s preliminary weekly change (+6,729) was the largest increase. New York’s preliminary weekly change (+4,341) was the second largest increase. Ohio’s preliminary weekly change (+3,004) was the third largest increase. Virginia’s preliminary weekly change (+569) was the eleventh largest increase.

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[1] Note: Advance claims are not directly comparable to claims reported in prior weeks. Advance claims are reported by the state liable for paying the unemployment compensation, whereas previous weeks reported claims reflect claimants by state of residence. In addition, claims reported as "workshare equivalent" in the previous week are added to the advance claims as a proxy for the current week's "workshare equivalent" activity.