New claims for unemployment benefits soared to a record 181,975 for the week of March 22-28, the Employment Security Department (ESD) announced Thursday.

The increase represents a 3,513 percent jump year over year, and a 41 percent increase over the previous week.

By comparison, according to the ESD, the rise is seven times the peak week during the 2008/2009 recession which was 26,075 weekly initial claims. Including the ongoing weekly claims that were filed, ESD saw roughly 350,000 claims come into its claims center last week.

“These numbers suggest two contrasting points,” said Employment Security Commissioner Suzi LeVine.

“One, that more and more businesses and individuals are abiding by the ‘Stay Home, Stay Healthy’ order – which is critical for the health of our fellow Washingtonians, and two, this virus is having a profoundly negative impact on our economic health, and that Washington businesses and workers are hurting like never before,” LeVine said.

LeVine said ESD recently improved its website, at esd.wa.gov, to assist people applying for unemployment benefits online.

Hundreds of additional staff have also been hired to the agency’s unemployment insurance team and call center hours have been expanded to include Saturdays.

“We’re using Sundays to return calls,” LeVine added.

“We are humbled here at ESD to help mitigate that economic impact by providing workers and businesses with some amount of relief, especially since we all play a key role in battling this virus,” she said.

Thus far, we have put more than $67 million into people’s pockets and into the Washington state economy since the start of the COVID crisis — between March 15 and March 28. This weekly amount will only grow as we expect weekly new claims to rise even further.”

Major industry sectors experiencing the highest percentage increase of initial claims during March 22-28 were:

• Construction: 28,021 initial claims, up 438 percent from the previous week;

• Wholesale trade: 5,207 initial claims, up 166 percent from the previous week;

• Manufacturing: 13,967 initial claims, up 165 percent from the previous week; and

• Retail trade: 22,002 initial claims, up 153 percent from the previous week.

The counties seeing the highest increase in total initial claims are:

• Snohomish County, up 55 percent from the week before (increase from 13,692 to 21,176);

• Pierce County: up 50 percent from the week before (14,730 to 22,145);

• Spokane County: up 38 percent from the week before (8,766 to 12,102); and

• King County, up 20 percent from the week before (increase from 37,296 to 44,613).

In Kitsap County, a total of 4,941 claims were filed the March 22 through March 28.

The previous week, a total of 3,606 claims were filed.

That’s a stark contrast to the number filed three weeks ago; 259 claims were filed between March 8 and March 15.