Investing.com - The number of Americans applying for initial unemployment benefits rose by 5.24 million last week, the U.S. Labor Department said Thursday, bringing the number of people laid off over the past month to almost 22 million, in an unprecedented surge in unemployment.
The consensus forecast had been for an increase of 5.105 million.
The number of people already receiving benefits increased to 11.98 million, the report said, up from 7.46 million a week earlier.
The record-breaking jump in unemployment has seen the last decade's worth of jobs growth being completely erased in a month.
The dismal figures came a day after data showing a record drop in U.S. retail sales in March and the biggest decline in factory output since 1946.
States and local governments have issued "stay-at-home" or "shelter-in-place" orders affecting more than 90% of Americans to control the spread of Covid-19, the respiratory illness caused by the virus. That has abruptly halted economic activity.
Analysts are predicting the economy, which they believe is already in recession, contracted in the first quarter at its sharpest pace since World War II.
"The decline in economic activity is breathtaking," said Joel Naroff, chief economist at Naroff Economics in Holland, Pennsylvania. "While we will see an initial upturn once the economy reopens, the strength and length of that recovery is not clear at all."
At the same time, separate reports showed that U.S. housing starts tumbled 22.3% to 1.216 million in March, while the Philly Fed manufacturing index plunged to -56.6 in April, the lowest level since 1980.
--Reuters contributed to this report