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I would consider underemployment to be a case where people are not making enough to live - food, health, shelter and clothes. Whether the area of work and their
by vaidhy 6y ago
I would consider underemployment to be a case where people are not making enough to live - food, health, shelter and clothes. Whether the area of work and their education qualification are a match, seems superfluous and an unwanted distraction from calculating labor participation and effective unemployment rate.
- jjk166 6y agoWell how much people need to live is highly variable and not very informative. If you get diagnosed with cancer and your medical expenses go through the roof but you're still making the same income, have you become underemployed? No, there isn't a problem with the job market here, there is a problem with healthcare costs. On the other hand if you were making $200k last year and now you can't find a job that'll pay you more than $100k, you'll still be able to afford the necessities of life as well as quite a few luxuries, but that's still an immense reduction in economic output which suggests deep issues with the job market. Underemployment is a measure of labor utilization. What you're describing is poverty, which is related but not equivalent.
- WarOnPrivacy 6y agoOutlier examples are kind of the opposite of mass trends.
- jjk166 6y agoNot getting a raise just because you have unexpected medical expenses or taking a pay cut after being laid off are hardly outlier examples.