Unemployed Individuals in South Carolina to Lose Benefits

The state of South Carolina currently has an unemployment rate of 9.3 percent, which is still relatively high and is higher than the national unemployment average, which is at 8.3 percent. The news only seems to be getting worse as unemployment benefits are going to run out for about 80,000 jobless individuals in the South Carolina area. Nearly 7,000 people are going to lose their unemployment benefits, after applying for an extension, which will ultimately begin during the month of April. The rest of the 80,000 employees receiving extended unemployment benefits are going to lose them by the time the year ends. This information was recently released by the Department of Employment and Workforce in South Carolina.

As of January, the individual who have lost their job in South Carolina will only be able to receive 20 weeks of checks from their unemployment office. When the Great Recession was at its worse, employees were able to get about 79 more weeks of unemployment benefits, which led to a complete total of nearly 99 weeks of unemployment checks and benefits. Because the state is dealing with such a high unemployment rate, the state ended up losing the extended benefits. Many other employees in quite a few other states will also be dealing with the same unfortunate fate.

An economist for Wells Fargo, Mark Vitner, was surprised by the news. He says that some of the areas in the state have extremely high unemployment rates and it is obvious that the people of South Carolina are still dealing with the huge mark that the recession left on the state and the entire United States as a whole. A lot of the counties in South Carolina have double digit unemployment rates which mean the unemployment rate in the area is still very high. The Great Recession, which began in 2007, left such a damper on the economy and the people in South Carolina are still suffering. It is believed that with the end of the extended benefits, many people will be forced to move to other areas where work is more plentiful because the work is just not there in many rural areas of South Carolina. There are people who have the skills but the jobs just are not available.

South Carolina is not the only state to lose its extension of jobless benefits. The other states that are also dealing with this loss include Kentucky, Ohio, Oregon, Tennessee, and more. The jobless rate in South Carolina has not been very good since the recession and seemed to be at its worst in 2010, when the unemployment rate was 12 percent. Many unemployed workers are now going to be forced back out into the job market, searching for jobs that may not be the best, simply because they have no other option anymore.