Emergency unemployment benefits in the U.S. expired two weeks ago, but employers who expected an increase in job applications are still largely waiting for them to roll in.
Federal programs that had offered an extra $300 per week for jobless Americans, provided extended benefits for the long-term unemployed and gave special aid for the self-employed expired Sept. 6. Economists and companies expected a wave of interest from workers as the financial lifeline was pulled away, hoping it would provide the incentive to get back into the workplace.
That hasn’t happened, according to employers across industries.
“People who have been on the sidelines have by and large stayed on the sidelines,” said Richard Wahlquist, president of the American Staffing Association, the country’s largest recruitment-industry group. “Nothing has changed in regard to the benefits that have fallen off and the need for people continues to grow.”
Even Wahlquist is struggling. He’s looking for 10 temporary workers to help at the organization’s conference in Denver at the end of the month, paying as much as $25 an hour. So far, he could only rustle up two.
Across the country, staffing firms and businesses have yet to see a marked uptick in employees. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. economists forecast that the expiration of the federal program this month, which affected about half of U.S. states after the rest ended benefits early, would add 1.3 million people to payrolls by year-end. Other analysts said an end to the federal program should increase labor supply.
Jobless claims for the week ended Sept. 11 showed an increase in people seeking benefits, though the effects of Hurricane Ida affected the data. In the meantime, the great labor shortage isn’t letting up, with a record 10.9 million job openings in July.
“We’re only going to see the impact of the federal UI benefits ending a couple of months from now -- I don’t think we’re going to see a big spike one way or another really,” said AnnElizabeth Konkel, an economist at Indeed Inc. “We thought things should be better by Labor Day and they’re not.”
One reason could be pent-up savings, according to Daniel Zhao, senior economist at Glassdoor Inc. Stimulus checks, boosted unemployment benefits and expanded social safety nets drove the savings rate to a record 34% last year, and it remained elevated at 9.6% in July.
Joanie Bily, chief workforce analyst at Atlanta-based EmployBridge, was one of the people who thought that her company would see a “significant increase” in the number of online applications once boosted benefits ended.