COLUMBIA, S.C. — The South Carolina Department of Employment and Work Force (DEW) announced 3,837 people in the state filed initial unemployment insurance (UI) claims during the week of Oct. 19-24. While this number rose slightly -- up 218 from the week prior -- it does continue an overall downward trend that started in mid-July.
To put the numbers in context, WLTX looked at unemployment data from October 2019 through September 2020 and graphed the number of unemployed workers and the percent of the workforce unemployed over that 11 month time period. The data available at the DEW website shows before the coronavirus pandemic, unemployment rates in South Carolina were on a steady decline and hovered around 2.4% -- 56,244 people unemployed . In March, at the onset of the pandemic, there was a slight increase to 3.2%, or 76,369 unemployed.
As the state began to feel the full effect of the pandemic and Gov. McMaster shut down businesses and schools, the unemployment rate for April 2020 jumped to 12.8% with 303,360 South Carolinians out of work. According to DEW's historical data, the last time the unemployment percentage was above 10% was in December 2009-January 2010 when DEW recorded an 11.7% unemployment rate. The highest non-COVID-19-related unemployment rate in South Carolina was in December 1982-January 1983 -- at 11.8% -- when the United States was beginning to come out of the economic depression under President Ronald Reagan.
Returning to 2020, the percent of unemployed remained above 12% for May 2020 before gradually declining over the summer months.
September 2020's preliminary report has 5.1% -- or 121,485 people -- unemployed in South Carolina.
For the week of Oct 18-24, DEW reports it has paid a total of $43.6 million in unemployment benefits. Since March 15, 2020, DEW has recorded payments of almost $4.5 billion ($4,482,916,297.10).
The counties recording the largest number of new initial UI claims were Richland (402 new claims), Greenville (370) and Horry (263). In the Midlands, Lexington County recorded 149 new UI claims, Sumter had 97 and Orangeburg had 73.
