RICHMOND— Virginia Works announced today that 2,224 unemployment insurance weekly initial claims were filed during the week ending May 18, 2024, which is 6.8 percent lower than last week's 2,386 claims and 10.0 percent lower than the comparable week of last year (2,470).  Nearly 84 percent of claimants self-reported an associated industry; of those reported, the top five industries (65 percent) were Accommodation and Food Services (329); Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services (239); Administrative and Support and Waste Management (208); Retail Trade (164); and Health Care and Social Assistance (163).

Continued weeks claims (15,851) were essentially unchanged from last week (15,847) and were 24.5 percent higher than the comparable week of last year (12,736). Nearly 93 percent of claimants self-reported an associated industry; of those reported, the top five industries (59 percent) were Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services (2,462); Administrative and Support and Waste Management (2,176); Health Care and Social Assistance (1,466); Retail Trade (1,336); and Manufacturing (1,326).

Significant Layoffs and Announcements are available at the following websites:

WARN Notices | Virginia Employment Commission

Announcements | Virginia Economic Development Partnership

Virginia Continued Weeks Claimed

A person who has already filed an initial claim and who has experienced a week of unemployment files a continued claim to claim benefits for that week of unemployment. On a weekly basis, continued claims reflect a good approximation of the current number of insured unemployed workers filing for UI benefits, and are a good indicator of labor market conditions. While continued claims are not a leading indicator, they provide confirming evidence of the direction of the economy.

The color-coded map below shows the distribution of this week’s continued claims for Virginia’s counties and cities.

Yellow represents low numbers, while progressively darker shades transitioning from yellow to green and dark green  signify increasing numbers of continued claims. The legend located at the bottom provides the color spectrum and its corresponding count of continued claims.

Initial Claims for All States

In the week ending May 18, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 215,000, a decrease of 8,000 from the previous week's revised level. The previous week's level was revised up by 1,000 from 222,000 to 223,000. The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 192,017 in the week ending May 18, a decrease of 5,663 (or 2.9 percent) from the previous week. The seasonal factors had expected an increase of 1,114 (or 0.6 percent) from the previous week. There were 201,921 initial claims in the comparable week in 2023. 

All States Initial Weeks Claimed

An initial claim is a claim filed by an unemployed individual after a separation from an employer. The count of U.S.  initial claims for unemployment insurance is a leading economic indicator because it is an indication of emerging labor market conditions in the country.

Below is a color-coded map illustrating the percentage change in initial claims from last week to this week across all states nationwide, derived from the latest U.S Department of Labor Weekly Claims News Release (https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf). Green denotes a reduction in continued claims from last week, thus showing improvement, with progressively darker shades of green signifying greater improvement. Purple denotes an increase in continued claims from last week,  thus showing deterioration, with progressively darker shades of purple signifying greater deterioration. Very light green, purple or white indicates minimal change from last week. The legend at the bottom provides the color spectrum along with its corresponding percentage value.