Folded sheet of paper with an unemployment graph on
By David Walsh

With another 4.4 million Americans filing for unemployment last week, so too did thousands of Tennesseans.

Between April 12 - 18, a total of 68,968 Tennesseans filed for unemployment for the first time, with more than half of those claims coming from Northern Middle Tennessee. Defined by the Tennessee Department of Labor (TDL) as 13 of Middle Tennessee’s northern most counties, including Williamson County, Northern Middle Tennessee saw a total of 29,065 new unemployment claims from April 12 - 18.

That figure represents the second weekly drop in new unemployment claims in both Northern Middle Tennessee and the state at large. View below to see the past five weeks’ worth of new unemployment claims:

  • March 8 - 14: 2,702
  • March 15 - 21: 39,096
  • March 22 - 28: 94,492
  • March 29 - April 4: 112,438
  • April 5 - 11: 74,772
  • April 12 - 18: 68,968

Combining unemployment data from the past four weeks in Northern Middle Tennessee, a total of 160,272 new unemployment claims were filed since March 15. Coupling that data with March’s unemployment rate, which was captured between March 8-14 and shows an unemployment number of 31,364, that would bring the total number of unemployed residents of Northern Middle Tennessee to 191,636.

With an estimated labor force in Northern Middle Tennessee of 1.1 million, and assuming those unemployed in March are still unemployed, that would bring the region’s average unemployment rate to a staggering 17.4 percent. For comparison, the average unemployment rate of Northern Middle Tennessee in March was 2.8 percent, with Williamson County reporting the single lowest rate in the state at 2.6 percent.

Looking at the state as a whole, a total of 393,469 Tennesseans filed for unemployment for the first time within the past four weeks. With data from March showing there to be a total of 116,846 unemployed Tennesseans, combining those two figures reveals there to likely be 510,315 unemployed Tennesseans.

With an estimated labor force of 3,362,841, Tennessee’s unemployment rate could very well be around 15.1 percent. For comparison, data from March showed the state’s unemployment rate to be around 3.5 percent.

These unemployment rates are estimates based on new unemployment claims data provided by the TDL. The official statewide unemployment rate for April will be released by the TDL on May 21.