5 ms·

"By comparison, the October jobless rate stood at 6.9%, down from 14.7% in April as workers regained jobs or gave up searching for work." I love how the hopele

• refurb 6y ago
  What’s with the lumping of different categories together? “Regained jobs” or “gave up searching”. One of those is good, one of those is bad. Seems like lazy reporting to just say “meh, one of those two”.
• 93po 6y ago
  This has sadly been the case for a long time. Some people try to defend it for various reasons and keeping track of this figure isn't a problem for me personally, but calling it the unemployment rate and acting like it's representative of reality bugs the heck out of me
  • qppo 6y ago
    It is reality. What it reflects about reality may not be immediately obvious but that's true of most metrics. It's important to understand that the value of the unemployment rate is not the absolute number but its change over time. We also have other metrics published alongside the unemployment rate, like labor participation.
    • kyriee 6y ago
      It’s seldom mentioned when talking about unemployment. Particularly when it comes to titles, so it’s fair to say excluding the hopeless from unemployment makes it a misleading metric
      • Mary-Jane 6y ago
        Which again, has been the case for a very long time. The participation rate has been tracked for as long; rather than changing how unemployment is calculated the media could just reporting that metric instead. Seems like a simpler solution.
        • _qulr 6y ago
          > Which again, has been the case for a very long time. We all seem to be admitting that it's a bad, misleading statistic. So why are we so committed to keeping it around forever? Why not change the definition? People say "for historical comparison", but what's the point of a historical comparison of a statistic that we all admit now is bad and misleading? The fact that something has always been done a certain way is no justification for continuing to do it, especially if the initial decision was misguided in some way.
      • qppo 6y ago
        I don't think it's seldom mentioned - it's both common knowledge among people who pay attention to financial/economic news and repeated monthly (when the new jobs report comes out). They're usually reported side by side. It's much more misleading to suggest that the people not included in the unemployment rate are the "hopeless" since it includes children, the retired, and those unable to work.
• nradov 6y ago
  They are counted in U-4 and other measures. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm
• wirthjason 6y ago
  These statistics are hard to calculate. Defining “actively searching for work” is one way. You have to draw a line in the sand somewhere. For example, say I’m the primary breadwinner and my wife works part time at a restaurant and cares for our daughter in the remaining time. Work goes slow and she gets laid off. She could actively try to find another job but decides to spend full time with our daughter instead. I don’t know that she’s “hopeless” but rather made a different choice. Certainly there are hopeless people. It’s hard to find a perfect measure.
  • II2II 6y ago
    It is difficult to define "actively searching for work" with a consistent baseline across the decades, but it is not all that difficult to arrive at a definition that is valid for any given point of time. Simply consider the social norms for the era. If it is considered normal to have two income households at any given point of time, then it is legitimate to include an unemployed spouse. Another route, similar to the one in this study, may be considering people who are actively searching for work and where the household income is below a certain threshold (likely based upon the composition of the family).
    • refurb 6y ago
      normal to have two income households The country is not monolithic. It could be considered typical, yet you might still have only 70% being two income households. It would be silly to include the other 30% as unemployed.
      • II2II 6y ago
        Yeah, that's one of the reasons why I suggested a hybrid of seeking employment and household income. It is similar to the one used by the study, except the article seems to use individual income rather than household income. Of course, there are still problems with that approach. For example: a baseline household income makes many assumptions about a decent standard of living, it would also be complicated to calculate due to variations in household size/composition and regional differences in the cost of living. That being said, "seeking employment" is likely one of the worse indications of unemployment. People may be excluded or impeded from joining the workforce for a variety of reasons and stop seeking employment because of that. It is a rather long list: discrimination (age, disability, gender, race), accommodations for disabilities, access to affordable childcare, criminal record, level of education. While some of those can be addressed, they rarely are addressed in a meaningful manner. In those cases I find it difficult to treat not-seeking employment as a choice.
• omgwtfbyobbq 6y ago
  The BLS should be using U-6, but I don't an administration would do that because it will make things look worse. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm
  • tootie 6y ago
    They do use U6. They use hundreds of data points. U3 is "headline unemployment" because it's a middle ground indicator that has a consistent meaning. It's not possible to summarize the employment landscape in a single number.
    • omgwtfbyobbq 6y ago
      I meant the federal government should use U-6 because it's closer to what most people think of as unemployment.
      • tootie 6y ago
        BLS is the federal government. Congress and the president have the entire data set produced by BLS. They also have state-level data and more. There are no statutes explicitly tied to U3. Click through all the links at the bottom of this report: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm
        • omgwtfbyobbq 6y ago
          I mean using it as what's commonly associated with unemployment. There aren't any requirements to use U3, but the DOL uses it instead of U6. I think most people's idea of unemployment is closer to other measures than it is to U3.
          • tootie 6y ago
            U6 includes underemployment. It's definitely not what most people think of as unemployment. It doesn't adjust for participation rate. Participation can be misleading because while there are definitely discouraged workers the size of the workforce varies naturally as people retire, become disabled or take time off for families. U3 helps track demand for employment and anyone outside the labor force isn't demanding work. That being said, the closest single metric to follow isn't any of the indices. Try prime age employment-population ratio. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=y51M https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=y51M
• elif 6y ago
  And it's more nefarious than simply a matter of misrepresenting statistics. For instance, I was denied even the minimum Pandemic Unemployment Assistance because I have been unemployed since before the pandemic began.
• koolba 6y ago
  Consistency in how statistics are measured is important. You can rag on the methods but without consistency it’d be meaningless. The majority of what you term as “hopeless” is seniors that are let go and eventually decide to retire rather than entering the work force at wages less than they earned previously. It’s not a bunch of disillusioned 20 somethings giving up on life.
  • vmception 6y ago
    I wonder if you are "hopelessly" misinformed or open to accepting information that conflicts with your worldview
  • Retric 6y ago
    The majority of hopeless people are a long way from retirement. Homeless, long term disability, or people living off of their parents etc. America is rich enough that bring poor represents a huge range of lifestyles from young raft guides living in leaky cabins to just about everything else.
    • mxcrossb 6y ago
      > The majority of hopeless people are a long way from retirement Source?
      • eigen 6y ago
        >> The majority of hopeless people are a long way from retirement >Source? assuming "long way from retirement" is 10+ years. Discouraged over job prospects age 24-55: 311k age 55+: 170k Discouraged workers are persons marginally attached to the labor force who did not actively look for work in the prior 4 weeks for reasons such as thinks no work available, could not find work, lacks schooling or training, employer thinks too young or old, and other types of discrimination. https://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea38.htm https://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cpseea38.htm
        • mxcrossb 6y ago