One in four Americans, 46 million in total, have lost their livelihoods over the past 13 weeks, One in four Americans, 46 million in total, have lost their livelihoods over the past 13 weeks, according to new data released by the Labor Department this Thursday. The latest week’s jobless claims totaled 1.5 million, slightly exceeding analysts’ expectations of 1.3 million. The number of people filing continuing unemployment claims reached 20.5 million during the week ending on June 6,  which is a slight decrease from the prior week’s 20.9 million figure.