A new unemployment statistics portal, sharing Coronavirus-related statistics for Pennsylvania, shows that McKean County rates in the manufacturing sector are much higher than the statewide representation.
Pennsylvania’s Center for Workforce Information & Analysis just announced the launch of an interactive dashboard for Weekly Unemployment Compensation Claims. The dashboard can be found by visiting https://www.workstats.dli.pa.gov/dashboards/Pages/Weekly-UC.aspx.
According to the release issued by the CWIA Customer Response Team, “The Weekly Unemployment Compensation Claims Dashboard provides an interactive look at the weekly reports located on our PA Unemployment Compensation Activity page. The dashboard allows you to select a week ending date, the type of claim (initial or continued), and an area (county or statewide).”
While statewide manufacturing is only 13% of the jobs lost from February to April, that number is a much higher portion of local unemployment statistics. Manufacturing is the top employment sector impacted in McKean (25.8%), Elk (52.8%), Cameron (61.3%) and Potter (17.9%) counties.
Statewide, arts, entertainment and recreation was the sector with the most unemployment at 64%, while accommodation and food service was next at 59.8%. Construction was third with a 40% unemployment rate.
The breakdown of information includes age group, gender, race/ethnicity, and industry sector. Visitors can download the data as a PDF or text file via the toolbar located in the bottom right-hand corner of the dashboard.
A visit to the site and settings of McKean County for the week ending May 16 shows that 2,528 ongoing claims are active and 91 new claims were filed.
The breakdown of claims by age shows that the highest represented group is of residents age 25-34, which is 23.2%. Next is the 45-54 age group at 20.5%; 35-44 at 19.9%; 55-64 at 18%, 20-24 at 9.1% and age 65 and older at 8.8%. In Elk County, meanwhile, there are 3,935 cases that are ongoing and 175 new claims filed for the same time period.
The claims in Elk County break down with the 55-64 age group at 22.9%, the 45-54 age group at 22.8% and the 25-34 age group at 19.7%.
Cameron County has 476 ongoing unemployment claims, with 34 new claims filed during the week ending May 16. Potter County has 912 ongoing claims and 27 newly filed.
In Cameron County, 27.3% of those unemployed are in the 45-54 age group, while in Potter County the 35-44 age group is the most impacted, at 22.8%.
In McKean and Potter counties, males are unemployed at a higher rate: 52.8% in McKean and 56.4% in Potter, compared to 47.2% of females in McKean and 43.6% in Potter. Meanwhile, in Elk and Cameron counties, the females are unemployed at a higher rate, 52.5% (Elk) and 51.7% (Cameron), compared to 47.5% of males in Elk and 48% of male Cameron County residents.
The Commonwealth Foundation shared some information gathered from this new resource, including the fact that “the 15.1% official unemployment rate is the highest on record (going back to 1976), and the percentage of the population employed is the lowest on record.
The number of people unemployed is the most ever in Pennsylvania history.”
The foundation also noted that more than one million payroll jobs—which excludes farming jobs and self-employed/contractors—were eliminated in April, and a total of 1.1 million were lost over a two-month period, which represents 17.9% of jobs lost from February to April.
