Unemployment claims in SC decrease for 3rd week; county breakdown of numbers

COLUMBIA, SC (WBTW) – The South Carolina Department of Employment and Workforce released updated unemployment numbers Thursday morning, showing a statewide decrease in claims for the third week in a row.

There were 46,747 initial intrastate claims, which are filed by people who both live and work in the state, filed in the week that ended on May 2. This is a decrease of 18,412 claims from the previous week, which saw 65,159 initial intrastate claims filed.

SCDEW also released an update county-by-county map of intrastate claims filed during the week ending on May 2.

According to this map, Horry County saw 4,318 claims filed during the week. This is a decrease from the previous week’s total number of 5,745 claims filed.

Florence County had 1,291 claims filed in the week, which is down from the 1,582 claims filed in the previous week.

In Darlington County, 532 claims were filed. This is a decrease from the 719 claims filed in the week before.

Marion County saw 298 claims filed, which is up from the previous week’s total of 284 claims filed.

Dillon County had 229 claims filed. This is a decrease from the previous week’s 233 claims filed.

In Marlboro County, 224 claims were filed, which is up from the 195 claims filed in the previous week.

Chesterfield County has 275 claims filed. This is down from 331 claims filed in the week before.

Georgetown County saw 598 claims filed, down from the previous week’s 751 claims.

SCDEW says from March 15 until May 5, the agency has paid more than $831 million in a combination of: state unemployment benefits, pandemic unemployment assistance for the self-employed and others and the federal pandemic unemployment compensation program.

On March 15, SCDEW says they had about 49 employees working in their call center. More than 500 employees are now working in the call center due to demand.

“Our agency is encouraged to report the third straight weekly decline in the number of
Unemployment Insurance (UI) initial claims. We understand, however, that this good news is
tempered by the record high number of claims overall,” said Dan Ellzey, Executive Director for SCDEW.

Ellzey also said that although claims are down for a third week, the number of new claims reported Thursday is “still well over four times higher than the number of initial weekly claims being filed during the Great Recession.”