RICHMOND—The Virginia Department of Workforce Development and Advancement (DWDA) announced today that the number of initial unemployment insurance claims rose in the latest filing week to 2,782 but remained slightly below typical pre-pandemic volumes experienced in 2019.

For the filing week ending January 6, seasonally unadjusted initial claims for unemployment insurance in Virginia were 2,782, which was an increase of 712 claimants from the previous week. Continued weeks claimed totaled 12,827, which was an increase from the previous week and an increase of 27 percent from the 10,089 continued claims from the comparable week last year. An industry was reported for ninety-three percent of continued claims. Of those, over half (58 percent) of continued claims were from administrative and support and waste management (1,849), professional, scientific, and technical services (1,687), manufacturing (1,213), construction (1,116), and health care and social assistance (1,077). 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 January 6, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 202,000, a decrease of 1,000 from the previous week's revised level. The previous week's level was revised up by 1,000 from 202,000 to 203,000. The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 317,048 in the week ending January 6, an increase of 47,632 (or 17.7 percent) from the previous week. There were 339,883 initial claims in the comparable week in 2023.

Looking at preliminary data, most U.S. states reported increases on a seasonally unadjusted basis. New York’s preliminary weekly change (+20,755) was the largest increase. California’s preliminary weekly change (+9,990) was the second largest increase. Texas’s preliminary weekly change (+8,915) was the third largest increase. Georgia’s preliminary weekly change (+6,024) was the fourth largest increase. Virginia had the 17^th largest increase (+558).