unemployment

First-time unemployment claims in Florida rolled in last month at a pace similar to the period before the coronavirus pandemic pounded the economy.

Unemployment continues to slowly improve in Florida as the state gets closer to regaining the number of jobs lost when the COVID-19 pandemic caused business closures and layoffs last year.

Some businesses are struggling to find employees and those employees are demanding better working conditions. The clash is especially obvious in college towns where businesses rely on student labor. Business owners and local politicians expected a meaningful boost to the economy after students returned to campus this fall. But some industries that were popular with students before the pandemic, have fallen out of favor.

The Department of Economic Opportunity (DEO) says of the jobs initially lost during the pandemic, nearly 80% have been recovered. In addition, the agency's Deputy Secretary Adrienne Johnston says there are more people in the labor force now than in February of last year. But Rep. Anna Eskamani (D-Orlando) says issues remain with the state's unemployment assistance system.

Gov. Ron DeSantis says he anticipates “pretty good” July unemployment numbers, as a federal report Thursday showed that first-time jobless claims last week in Florida were at a level not seen since before the coronavirus pandemic.

For the first time in more than a year, Florida has posted a weekly count of new unemployment claims below 6,000. The Florida Department of Economic Opportunity marks March 15, 2020 as the start of the pandemic in compiling unemployment claims.

Gov. Ron DeSantis says unemployment claimants will likely have to show how they looked for work once an executive order waiving a work-search requirement ends this month.

Florida House and Senate leaders have reached a deal over a plan to tax out-of-state online sales. The plan calls for using the estimated $1.2 billion in revenue to replenish the state’s unemployment trust fund and lower the unemployment tax on businesses.

Florida’s CONNECT unemployment benefits system failed to connect to much of anything in the early days of the pandemic, leaving millions of recently laid-off Floridians in the cold. The company that built it, Deloitte, has worked to distance itself from the system and is a defendant in a lawsuit against the state. Now, a new state audit reveals the problems go deeper than previously thought and lawmakers are weighing how to fix the system.

Florida’s jobless rate dipped 0.2 percentage points in December amid what state officials said is growing economic confidence as the COVID-19 pandemic continues.