First of all this is the number that all of the news media use. Isn’t it almost completely meaningless for the real world? They say 200,000 (plus some change) were “created” in March. If I recall correctly the workforce is something like 80 million. So 1% of 80 million is 800,000 so how can unemployment change by 1% over a month if only 200,000 new jobs have been added? Does anyone know of a good place that really breaks these numbers down because I’ve read from multiple sources that real unemployment is something like ~16-20%.
What the “official” rate is is U-3. The government collects information all the way up to U-6, which includes many more categories of workers who are underemployed (part time workers who want to work full time, looked for a job, etc.).
The US also changed the way it measures Unemployment (to make the numbers look better) in about 1994. So shadowstats.com calculates it the old way (making the % Unemployed even higher).
Looks like the past month U-3 (Seasonal) changed by .1%.
Edit: Turns out its 1994 instead of 1992.
So according to shadowstats, current unemployment is actually something like 23%.
Reported percentages represent only those unemployed who were recently terminated or still on benefits. In otherwords, say after EVERYONE finally became unemployed, say 2 years hence, the statistic would read 0% unemployment…and maybe on the financial page, lol 100% homeless.
Once who lose the unemployment benefit status you are summarily disregarded by the statistical parameters.