WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The global unique coronavirus crisis continues to batter the U.S. labor market, with millions more Americans, including clerical employees, expected to have filed for welfare recently as the hit from the pandemic overflow into a wider swath of the economy.
FILE PHOTO: A woman searches for info on the application for joblessness assistance at the New Orleans Office of Workforce Advancement, as the spread of coronavirus illness (COVID-19) continues, in New Orleans, Louisiana U.S., April 13,2020 REUTERS/Carlos Barria
Thursday’s weekly out of work claims report from the Labor Department, the most timely data on the economy’s health, would cement economists’ expectations for a third straight month of huge task losses in May. The report would come a day after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell cautioned of an “prolonged period” of weak development and stagnant earnings.
The economy lost a staggering 20.5 million tasks in April, the steepest plunge in payrolls since the Great Depression of the 1930 s, as businesses were locked down to slow the spread of COVID-19, the respiratory disease brought on by the virus.
” We are on the back end of the very first wave of layoffs, today we are transitioning from the natural-disast