Stellar Coffee Company in downtown San Marcos temporarily closed its operations during the COVID-19 pandemic. Eddie Gaspar/The Texas Tribune
Another 5.2 million Americans applied for unemployment relief last week, marking more than 20 million people who have lost their jobs since the coronavirus pandemic began spreading in the United States. In the week ending April 3, at least 313,832 Texans applied for unemployment relief.
Thursday morning the latest unemployment data was released, a whopping 5.2 million Americans filed for unemployment in the last week. Roughly, 22 million Americans filed in the last month.
It’s a difficult situation across the country and Houston is not immune. “It’s just tough across the board, mentally, financially, it’s just draining,” said Houstonian Zacchaeus Davis.
Davis has a job but is financially strapped.
“I haven’t gotten a paycheck in, it’s been a few months now,” said Davis.
Experts predicted 5 million Americans filed for unemployment in the last week. However, when the data showed it was 5.2 million Americans, the stock market surged.
“So even though the numbers are bad, as long as it stays within what the market projects the market will handle those numbers very well,” said Director of Financial Planning for RIA Advisors, Richard Rosso.
Rosso does not expect a v-shape recovery going forward, he foresees more volatility.
“In a post COVID world no one has any idea what it’s going to look like, nobody has any clue as to what’s going to happen,” said Rosso.
Another expert said the unemployment rate could as high as 20% in April, which would be the highest rate since the depression.
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