By Thomas Montana
New York saw a 15.35% increase in unemployment claims in the week of June 30 compared to the previous week, according to a recent report from WalletHub. In addition, New York had the eleventh highest increase in jobless claims in the nation, and was one of 23 states, plus the District of Columbia, to see a weekly increase in claims. It also had the eighth-most per-capita claims nationwide, with 183 for every 100,000 people in the labor force.
The only bright spot was that New York’s number of weekly jobless claims was down 15.19% compared to the same week last year. This can be backed up by New York’s unemployment rate, which has also gone down since last year. As of June 2025, New York’s unemployment rate is at 4.0% compared to 4.3% in June 2024, per the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). The BLS also reported that more than 100,000 people joined the workforce last month compared to the same month in 2024, a 1.0% increase.
Experts agree the economy and the job market are more unpredictable than ever.
“It’s hard to imagine consumer and employer confidence rising any time soon,” said Joyce Jacobsen, Professor of Economics at Hobart and William Smith Colleges and Wesleyan University, told WalletHub. “The best-case scenario for the year is low but positive growth rather than a turn towards recession, but 2025 may well manage to do this as the full effects of the tariffs and other administrative policies may not become clear until after the holiday season, boding less well for 2026.”
“At the current moment, our institutions are unable to offer us this predictability,” said Richard L. Pate, Associate Professor of Law at Sacred Heart University to WalletHub. “We have continuous executive orders creating anything but predictability, whether they relate to immigration or tariffs, these policies are all over the place, changing almost daily.”