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Remember that the government doesn't count people who are not looking for work (perhaps because they've given up hope of ever finding a job, for example) as "un
by pmoriarty 4y ago
Remember that the government doesn't count people who are not looking for work (perhaps because they've given up hope of ever finding a job, for example) as "unemployed".
So the actual number of people who are not working is certainly higher.
- lotsofpulp 4y agoThe government does count them, in the U-6 statistic. https://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm https://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm
- bumby 4y agoWhat unemployment metric was used in the linked article? It wasn't immediately apparent to me.
- lotsofpulp 4y agoThat is a good question, and it is not apparent to me either. The linked article is: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.nr0.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.nr0.htm and the technical note link is: https://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.tn.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.tn.htm which says >Employment estimates are benchmarked, or ratio adjusted, monthly to the strike-adjusted employment estimates of the Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey. A ratio of CES to JOLTS employment is used to adjust the levels for all other JOLTS data elements.
- boole1854 4y agoIf otherwise unspecified, the "unemployment rate" refers to U-3, which is also called "the official unemployment rate" by the BLS. https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm
- dragontamer 4y agoAlways assume U-3 if otherwise not reported. U5 and U6 exist if you really need it. But historically speaking, everyone always has used U3 as the base discussion point. We all know U3 has its flaws, but I've never really found a situation where U5 or U6 would make a sizable difference in an argument. The only people who seem to play U3 vs U5 vs U6 games are those who are jumping statistics between arguments, to mislead and misdirect. IMO anyway. A good arguer always uses U3. When someone else runs out of things to say, they start criticizing U3 itself (ignoring the easily accessible U5 or U6 statistics). So its a good indicator for when a discussion has run its course.
- pessimizer 4y ago> A good arguer always uses U3. No, a good arguer ignores U3. It's a favored statistic by administrations because it's designed to improve even if circumstances haven't changed. People challenging administrations prefer U5 or U6 because they don't improve even when circumstances haven't changed. Good arguers ignore all three and use prime-age employment: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12300060 https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS12300060
- bnmathm 4y agoprime-age employment available by state anywhere?
- boole1854 4y agoAnd here is the chart comparing unemployed according to U-6 to the job openings: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=Vx5b https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=Vx5b
- plantwallshoe 4y agoYeah but if that aspect of the data hasn’t changed then the chart is still useful for seeing trends, and the rate is the lowest since at least 2007.
- finneganscat 4y ago
- gadders 4y agoSimilar in the UK: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/how-are-five-million-brits-without-work-/ https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/how-are-five-million-bri...
- bullen 4y agoHow come the UK has had Universal "Income" since 2015 and nobody found out? Aha, it's not Universal "have £16,000 or less in money, savings and investments".
- yieldcrv 4y agoRemember that a company that only hires the best, is only hiring people looking right now
- idontpost 4y ago
- Retric 4y agoMany companies actively recruit the employed. As an extreme, the pipeline of Hollywood movie production is an interesting model for working with “the best” people. Most positions aren’t that exclusive, but finding the right people is actually a major concern.
- yieldcrv 4y agoYes, but it relies on them being swayed. If they are not swayed to be looking, they are not candidates.
- randomdata 4y agoThe media doesn't normally latch on to metrics that include people not looking for work as they look for the cheap and easy soundbites, but the government counts them. There are many measures of unemployment to account for all the different ways you might want to look at things. Why wouldn't they maintain multiple measures of unemployment? It is obviously something that cannot be summed up in a single figure.
- alistairSH 4y agoThe media (almost) always uses U-3. It's the agreed upon value. The others exist and get updated at the same time, but for most purposes U-3 is good enough. The other values generally track along with U-3, they really only matter when that correlation breaks (ie, it's good to check them, but you only mention them when there's something interesting with them specifically).
- randomdata 4y agoYes, that's what I said, making it ridiculous to claim that the government doesn't count them. Why wouldn't they count them? It doesn't require all that much additional effort.
- nashashmi 4y agoThey have been saying that for like 20 years just to make some politician look bad. Reality is that after two years no one can really get back in the same job without some sort of bridge trainings for any job. So yes they are still looking. Just not necessarily the same type of job.
- bigbacaloa 4y agoThe US government. There are others.
- rmah 4y agoThis is a myth. The government publishes multiple unemployment rates (https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm) along with the "official" headline rate. You probably want the U-4 or U-5 rate. In reality, all of the rates are highly correlated and what's important is the rate relative to historical norms.
- marcosdumay 4y agoYes, you can discover the more useful number of how many people in working condition do not have a job. It's not hidden or anything. But that number is not the unemployment rate. That means the graph on the article uses the less useful number. And the GP's notice is relevant.
- rmah 4y agoI don't know, it seems to me the ratio of "jobs available" vs "people looking for a job" is more useful and meaningful than "jobs available" vs (people looking for a job + people disgusted with working so not looking). But maybe that's just me.
- ghaff 4y ago>people disgusted with working so not looking That's pretty absolute. There are plenty of people above a certain age who depending on skills, preferences, and savings are in some gray area between working, zero interest in working for pay at all (whether "disgusted" by work or just ready to move on), and will do a little work on the side for the money/human contact/intellectual stimulation etc.
- anonporridge 4y agoMyth is an overly harsh label. When the headline unemployment rate is the only thing the vast majority of people hear about and what politicians boast about, it's entirely reasonable to remind people that it's common to misunderstand what "unemployment rate" actually means. Most people do think it's something closer in relation to labor participation rate.
- joe_the_user 4y agoOppositely, I suspect they do count fake (or unfillable) job openings that employers post for a variety of reasons (needed formally for internal promotions to the need to say you're hiring in order to say you're growing to bureaucracies confused about they're aims etc).
- paulpauper 4y agoThe US shows it at 7% but in many areas it seem like way a higher percentage men of working age are not working . It's probably closer to 30%