INDIANAPOLIS – Nearly 16,000 Hoosiers filed first-time unemployment claims in the week ending on Oct. 17, about eight times the pre-pandemic weekly total.
The number of claims for the week was 15,941, a slight decrease from the previous week's adjusted total of 17,916. The last week's number was higher than the previous 10 weeks.
The number of claims in Indiana remained above 20,000 for 17 straight weeks from early March to mid-July. After that, it stayed in the 10,000 range until two weeks ago.
In the past few weeks, the unemployment numbers have been lower than at any point during the pandemic, but they're still much higher than pre-pandemic numbers.
In the 28 weeks since the COVID-19 pandemic began, more than a million Hoosiers have filed for unemployment.
