By Associated Press
Oklahoma City, OK – Oklahoma sets unemployment claims record
OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) Oklahoma has set a new record for unemployment benefits as the number of jobless in the state remains near a 21-year high.
John Carpenter is a spokesman for the Oklahoma Employment Security Commission. He said Wednesday the state has paid a little more than $575 million in regular unemployment benefits since Jan. 1. The state paid just $182.6 million all of last year.
Carpenter says that, last week, the state paid $23.72 million in benefits on 74,814 jobless claims. That is down slightly from the week before, when the state paid out $23.77 million on 74,845 unemployment claims a new weekly record.
The state's jobless rate for November was 7 percent, down three-tenths of a percent from October when unemployment was the highest since January 1988.