The number of people receiving unemployment benefit in Ireland rose by a record amount in March as the measures on social distancing brought whole industries to a standstill.

Ahead of the official release this Thursday, the Department of Employment and Social Affairs has confirmed that the pandemic unemployment benefit has already been paid to 283K people so far. This is in addition to the c.200K people in receipt of the standard jobseeker’s allowance. This would bring the unemployment rate to c.17%.

To put the scale of the increase in context, in February, there were 183K on the Live Register, while at the peak of the economic crisis in 2011, there were 470K on the register. During the GFC, it took three years to rise to that level. This time, it took less than three weeks.

In addition to the more generous unemployment benefit, the Irish government has also introduced a separate job subsidy scheme with the goal of maintaining the link between the employer and the employee in what is likely to be a temporary crisis.

Goodbody Stockbrokers say it is early days to be judging the take up of this scheme as it was only legislated for at the end of last week. Nevertheless, 25K have applied for this scheme relative to the 283K on the unemployment benefit. There has been some criticism of some elements of the scheme by SMEs. Depending on the take up of the scheme over the coming weeks, some administrative changes may be
required.

According to Goodbody Stockbrokers, "While the scale of the increase in unemployment is frightening, it is likely that we have not seen the worst just yet. Additional restrictions on commercial life introduced last Friday, particularly in construction, mean that further increases are likely."

Source: www.businessworld.ie