A record 3.3 million Americans applied for unemployment benefits last week, the Labor Department said Thursday, as restaurants, hotels, barber shops, gyms and more shut down in a nationwide effort to slow the spread of the deadly coronavirus.
Laid off workers say there was
such a crush of people applying for jobless benefits at once that they waited hours on the phone and the websites in several states, including New York and Oregon, crashed.
Many economists say the coronavirus recession has already commenced and what happened last week is only the beginning of a massive spike in unemployment that could result in over 40 million Americans losing their jobs by April.
