Florida sees sharp drop in new unemployment claims

First-time unemployment rate claims went down for the week in Florida.

It’s been a robust Summer for employment in Florida as yet another weekly report of first-time unemployment claims shows a big drop in filings, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

There were 5,258 initial jobless benefits claims filed in Florida for the week ending July 27, before seasonal adjustments. That’s a decrease from the previous week when there were 7,059 initial claims, representing a decrease of 1,801 claims week to week.

It’s also the first time this Summer that the number of weekly initial jobless claims has fallen below 6,000 in a week in Florida. That hasn’t happened since the week ending May 4, when there were 5,893 first-time jobless claims in the state.

For the past seven weeks, Florida had seen falling first-time jobless claims, except for one week. The Sunshine State’s numbers have also tended to buck the national trend, where filings have tended to increase.

The national trend was in line with Florida for the past week, though, as there were 215,827 first-time claims for unemployment benefit claims across the nation. That’s a weekly decrease of 21,901 filings, or a 9.7% drop nationally, before seasonal adjustments.

Weekly first-time jobless claim numbers have been generally positive for Florida for the Summer months after back-and-forth movement for much of this year heading into Spring. But once June hit, the numbers have been trending downward, representing a more stable picture for weekly initial unemployment claims in the state.

The weekly report also reflects a broader and stable unemployment picture for Florida this year, which Gov. Ron DeSantis has seized on to promote his policies. The general monthly unemployment figure has remained unchanged for three months straight, holding steady at 3.3% for June. That figure hasn’t changed since March, and even the early months of the year were hovering around 3.1% or 3.2%.

Florida’s general unemployment rate has remained lower than the national unemployment rate for 44 straight months.