Unemployment, underemployment rates up again
Nearly 2 million Americans have lost jobs in the past three months, the U.S. Department of Labor is reporting this morning, pushing the nation’s unemployment rate to 7.6 percent.
All told, 11.6 million Americans are now listed as unemployed. Another 7.8 million people seeking full-time work are working part-time, a population that has grown 3.1 million over the past 12 months. Overall unemployment itself is up by 3.6 million dating back to the start of the economic recession in December 2007.
A third group that we should look at in terms of getting a full view of the current labor-market situation in the U.S. is those who have been looking for a job in the past 12 months but did not do so in the four weeks looked at for the most recent Department of Labor survey. The department calls them “discouraged workers,” and they numbered 2.1 million in this report.
That gives us a grand total of unemployed and underemployed at 21.5 million, or 14.0 percent of the U.S. labor force.
- Story by Chris Graham
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