Welcome to New York City, where 8 million jobs have been lost since the start of the recession. As of June 2021,over 413,800 people are unemployed – approximately 10.4 percent of the labor force. Fear not, it seems like jobs are slowly, but surely growing and now there is no better time to reinvent yourselves, start a side hobby and redefine what it is that you want to be doing with your life.
In the meantime, you can turn to the support of the New York City Dept of Labor - where you can apply for Unemployment Insurance benefits, also known as UI. The separate Pandemic Unemployment Assistance (PUA) as part of the Stimulus package expired in NY and across several other US states on Sept 21, 2021.
In this article, we’ll be going over simple ways to apply for NYC unemployment benefits and some other frequently asked questions.
Am I eligible for UI benefits?
Generally, if you are a full-time W2 employee who has lost your job due to no fault of your own (such as downsizing ) you are eligible to receive UI benefits.If you’ve been laid off due to the Coronavirus, or due to lack of business because of the Coronavirus, or because your business had to close: you are eligible.
## How Much Does New York State Unemployment Pay? How much you receive it depends on how much you were making before you were laid off. The DOL calculates how much you are eligible for using various arcane formulae derived from ancient forbidden texts. Use our guide by clicking on the title to review.
According to the NYC Department of Labor,
*“The city's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 10.6 percent in June 2021, a drop of 0.3 percent from May and a decrease of 8.2 percent from June 2020. New York State's rate was 7.7 percent in June 2021. The share of the city's working age population (16+) who were either employed or looking for a job was 61.5 in June” *
Do I have to search for work every week?
Yes. See this guidance from NYDOL here. NYDOL doesn't expect you to be very successful with the plague still going on, but the point is you should TRY. You can use our Linkedin Guide to updating optimizing your profile to figure out how to hit target decisionmakers at the companies you want to work at.
