EF-0. Economy Stats with links to original sources. Links to LBN jobs threads thru 12/8/23

[progree]

2. EF-2. Unemployment Rate, Labor Force Participation Rate, Unemployment Insurance Claims

Last edited Thu Sep 1, 2022, 10:44 PM - Edit history (45)

{#} Job Loss and Creation - Unemployment Rate, Labor Force Participation Rate

# Unemployment Rate, from 1948 on: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000
# Labor Force Participation Rate from 1948 on: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000
# Employment-To-Population Ratio aka Employment Rate http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000
# Labor Force Participation Rate, Prime Age (Ages 25-54) https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300060
# Employment-To-Population Ratio, Prime Age (Ages 25-54) https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300060
# Labor Force Participation Rate, Double Prime Age (Ages 25-34) http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300089
# Employment-To-Population Ratio, Double Prime Age (Ages 25-34) http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300089

(on all of the above, you can change the "From" and "To" dates to whatever you want at the top center pulldown boxes)

# Regional and state employment and unemployment http://www.bls.gov/news.release/laus.nr0.htm

# Unemployment rate, seas adjusted of recent presidents

All values are the unemployment rates, specifically Jan 1989, Jan 1993, Jan 2001, Jan 2009), with the exception of the current unemployment rate under Obama, which is the end of last month.

(If you get into discussions about Obama's unemployment rate, it is worthwhile to point out that if one starts from June 2009, when the recession ended according to the NBER (the official arbiter of economic turning points, NBER.org), and just 5 months after Obama took office, then the unemployment rate has been cut by 4.7 percentage points. Obama cannot be blamed for the job losses in his first 5 months, given that the economy Bush handed him was losing 753,000 jobs PER MONTH in his last 3 months, and it takes many months to enact and implement new policies and for them to take effect.)

Unemployment rates:

Bush I: 5.4% to 7.3%, Change= + 1.9%
Clinton: 7.3% to 4.2%, Change= - 3.1%
Bush II: 4.2% to 7.8%, Change= + 3.6%

Obama's first 5 months: 7.8% to 9.5%, Change= + 1.7% (Jan '09 - May '09)
Obama thereafter: 9.5% to 4.7%, Change= - 4.8% (Jun '09 - Jan '17)
Obama entire term: 7.8% to 4.7%, Change= - 3.1% (Jan '09 - Jan '17)

Trump so far: 4.7% to 3.6%, Change= - 1.1% (Jan '17 - Jan '20)

(June 2009, just 5 months after Obama took office, is when the recession ended, per NBER.org)

# Under Bush II, the unemployment rate rose by 3.6 pp (percentage points) while the Civilian Labor Force Participation rate fell 1.5 pp: from 67.2% to 65.7% (had the participation rate stayed the same, the unemployment rate would have risen even further.

Contrast Bush's record to Clinton's, where the unemployment rate dropped 3.1 pp while the Civilian Labor Force Participation rate rose by 1.0 pp.

Secret information: Under Obama the unemployment rate decreased by only 3.0 percentage points, from 7.8% to 4.8%, while the civilian labor force participation rate fell 2.8 percentage points, from 65.7% to 62.9%.

However, the more important Employment to Population Ratio fell by a much lesser 0.7 percentage points, from 60.6% to 59.9, thanks in large part to the aging of the population and boomer retirements.

Looking at the prime working age population (ages 25-54), their Employment to their Population Ratio ( http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300060 ) during Obama's presidency has increased a bit (1.0 percentage points), from Jan 2009 (77.0%) to January 2017 (78.2%). Not much considering we're talking about over 7-1/2 years that began deep in the Great Recession (Obama took office 13 months after the start of the Great Recession, and 13 months before the job market bottom was reached in February 2010). And no retiring aging boomers to blame since we're talking about the age 25-54 workforce, not the entire age 16+ workforce.

BLS.GOV: "The labor force is the number of people ages 16 or older who are either working or looking for work. It does not include active-duty military personnel or the institutionalized population, such as prison inmates".

One reason for the decline in the labor force participation rate during the last several years is the retirement of large numbers of baby boomers. Remember that the population being counted is everyone 16 and over -- no matter how old (again excepting active duty military and institutionalized populations). Between 2000 and 2010, the number of Americans aged 62 and over increased by 21% while the U.S. population as a whole increased by 9.7%, according to the Population Connection Reporter 12/2012

In the 2000 Census, the number of Americans aged 60 to 69 -- that is, those who had recently hit retirement age or would do so within a few years -- was about 20 million. But thanks to the Baby Boomers, the number surged in the 2010 Census to more than 29 million, almost a 50 percent increase --Poltifact 10/8/12 http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/oct/08/american-future-fund/ad-says-workforce-smaller-under-barack-obama-any-t/

Already, 1 in 5 boomers have retired, according to AARP The Magazine, February 2014.

Update: 47% are in retirement according to this 4/9/2019 CNBC.com article
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/09/baby-boomers-face-retirement-crisis-little-savings-high-health-costs-and-unrealistic-expectations.html

Some point out that the labor force participation rate (LFPR) of elderly Americans is higher than in recent years. People erroneously conclude from that factoid that baby boomer retirements can't be contributing to the overall labor force participation rate decline. How can baby boomer retirements cause the overall LFPR to decline when the retirement age population's LFPR is increasing?

Answer: because the retirement age population is increasing so rapidly that it is an ever larger share of the age 16+ population (see above). And although the retirement age population has a higher LFPR than before (its been on a general rising trend since 1985 - hey, thanks Reagan!), still, their LFPR is far less than that of the non-elderly population. For example, the LFPR (not seas adjusted) for age 65+ was 20.3% in January 2020, and indeed it is up considerably from the 14.1% rate in December 2003 ( LNU01300097 ). But that LFPR is still far far below the average for the entire 16+ population (seas adj): 63.4% in January 2020 ( LNS11300000 )

In short, the rapid proportional increase in the age 65+ population (a population with less than 1/3 the LFPR of the rest of the population) overwhelms the effect of the increasing of the 65+ population's LFPR.

One quantitative estimate I've run across of the impact of baby boomer retirements is this from Marilyn Geewax from NPR National Public Radio, 1/21/14 ( http://www.mprnews.org/story/2014/01/21/business/whats-behind-the-falling-unemployment-rate ):

"Many economists say retirements are causing about half of the labor force shrinkage. Others say it's 60 percent, and yet others believe it's more like 40 percent."

In other words, 50% +/- 10%. Lets call it about half.

According to a July 2014 analysis by the Council of Economic Advisers, speaking of the 3.1 percentage point decline in the Labor Force Participation Rate from the final quarter of 2007 to the second quarter of 2014, "About half of the decline (1.6 percentage point) is due to the aging of the population. While older workers today are participating in the labor force at higher rates than older workers of previous generations, there is still a very large drop-off in participation when workers enter their early 60s."

For more on that, http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/docs/labor_force_participation_report.pdf

Update 8/1/14: http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2014/08/01/employment-situation-july

The Commissioner of Labor Statistics at the Bureau of Labor Statistics also said the boomer retirements and aging workforce accounts for about half the drop in the LFPR. And about 1/4 due to the recession and 1/4 due to long term trends that preceded the recession ... sounded like she is on the same page as the Council of Economic Advisers and maybe she is using their analysis. - interviewed by Leslie Marshall around 1230a 7/23/14 (probably Dr. Erica L. Groshen - http://blogs.bls.gov/blog/commissioners_biography/ , http://blogs.bls.gov/blog/ ),

To be sure, the increasing of the retirement age population is not the only reason for the declining LFPR (it's about half the reason according to the above). For example, the LFPR of the age 25-34 year old population (seas adj) changed only slightly from 82.5% in December 2003 (and 83.1% in December 2007) to 83.8% in January 2020 ( http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300089 ) while their Employment To Population Ratio ( http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300089 ) changed from 77.6% in December 2003 (and 79.0% in December 2007) to 80.7% in January 2020 (well, its up only 3.1% from December 2003 to January 2020. But I discount or ignore comparisons to December 2007 as that was the height of the housing bubble-produced hyper-job market. Actually I'm pleased to see this statistic is up somewhat compared to December 2003 -- a point I chose as kind of a midpoint between the end of the dot-com crash and the beginning of the housing mania).

LATER, 2/8/20 - I'm going to have to rewrite a lot of the above. The LFPR and Employement-to-Population Ratio (ETPR) of the age 25-34 demographic had long been below their 2000 and 2007 peaks. But they have both essentially recovered:

For convenience the links to the labor force particpation rate and the employment to population ratio are:
LFPR, age 25-34: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300089
ETPR, age 25-34: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300089
LFPR, age 25-54: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300060
ETPR, age 25-54: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300060

For the graphs, a good start date to pick is 1987 -- before 1987 the LFPR and ETPR were much lower due to generally lower female workforce participation rates.

The ETPR of the 25-34 demographic is at 80.7% in January 2020. This is slightly down from the 80.0% housing bubble high in 2007, and 2.5% below the dotcom bubble high of 2000. It exceeds the only other peak, 80.1% in 1989. Before 1989, the ETPR was considerably lower than these levels because the female workforce participation was less than in recent decades. The current level is a bit above the highs of 1990 and the housing bubble high. But well below the dot-com bubble high. It looks like it’s a little bit above the 1987-2008 average. Anyway, the take-away is that the ETPR of this 25-34 age demographic is well above the average of the 1989-2020 period, even excluding the Great Recession crash and recovery years.

The LFPR of the age 25-34 demographic, 83.8% in January 2020, is only 0.2% down from its Housing Bubble high (84.0% in early 2008), and 1.5% down from the dotcom bubble high in 2000 (85.3%). It's down 0.6% from the 1989 peak (84.4%). Anyway, the take-away is that the LFPR of this 25-34 age demographic is about the same as the average of the 1989-2020 period, excluding two outlier periods: the 1996-2002 Dot-com peak years and excluding the Great Recession crash and recovery years.

(I deliberately selected a young population in the above paragraph because one hears a lot about the extra difficulty the young are having finding jobs. At the same time, I also chose a population that is for the most part well above college age because a population with a significant portion of high school and/or college age people would add to the complexity of the analysis and explanation when there exists a good productive choice other than work).

# Like the age 25-34 LFPR and ETPR, the age 25-54 LFPR and ETPR are considerably lower before 1987 due to less female workforce participation.

# I'll have to do much more analysis before I can determine what part of the overall LFPR decline is due to the increasing proportion of elderly people. The best way to find data series (that I have found) is this tool: http://data.bls.gov/pdq/querytool.jsp?survey=ln

A broader look at unmployment rates, by president, 1948-2016, and then with a graph of each presidency's unemployment rate

with a mini-explanation of each https://historyinpieces.com/research/us-unemployment-rates-president
Credit: UpInArms 4/9/20 https://www.democraticunderground.com/10142466757#post17

Unemployment rates, by ethnicity (white, Hispanic, black), age, and gender

. . http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t01.htm
. . http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t02.htm (race, then sex, some age)
. . http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t03.htm (continuation of t02.htm)

. . Here's a fascinating one showing the above over time: snapshots of 1998, 2008, 2018; and 2028 projection
. . . . https://www.bls.gov/emp/tables/civilian-labor-force-participation-rate.htm


Unemployment rate: U1, U2, U3, U4, U5, U6 - Table A-15. Alternative measures of labor underutitlization
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t15.htm
Definitions: http://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm
See U-1 thru U-6 together, each line a different color (scroll down to Chart # 20 ): http://www.bls.gov/web/empsit/cps_charts.pdf

. # U-1, U-2: U-1 is http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS13025670 and U-2 is http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14023621 if anyone cares

. # U-3 Unemployment rate, seasonally adjusted (this is the headline official unemployment rate number) http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000

. # U-4 Total unemployed plus discouraged workers, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus discouraged workers, seasonally adjusted http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS13327707

. # U-5 Total unemployed, plus discouraged workers, plus all other marginally attached workers, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all marginally attached workers, seasonally adjusted
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS13327708

. # U-6 Total unemployed, plus all marginally attached workers plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of all civilian labor force plus all marginally attached workers, seasonally adjusted. This is the BLS's broadest measure of unemployment. http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS13327709


{#} Job Loss and Creation - Unemployment Insurance Claims

# This week's unemployment insurance claims report: https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf

# Unemployment insurance initial claims, week by week: http://workforcesecurity.doleta.gov/unemploy/claims.asp

    Initial claims (FRED): https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/ICSA

# It peaked at 667,000 initial claims 3/28/09 (2 months after Obama took office) and since then it has shown a steady improvement excepting relatively minor bumps until about December 2011. Since December 2011 it has been inching down slowly, but steadily, for example -- the average of the 4 weeks with ending dates in December 2011 was 377,000; while the last 4 weeks through week ending October 1, 2016 averaged 253,500. That was the lowest since December 8, 1973, almost 43 years ago). Since then, it has been pretty flat at very low levels (very near the lows of 1969, and remember this statistic is not adjusted for population size). In the 4 weeks ending February 1, 2020, it averaged 211,750 (down 8,500 from a year ago).

# Continued Claims (Insured Unemployment) (CCSA) (FRED): https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CCSA


# Myth: "those who have exhausted their unemployment insurance benefits are not counted as unemployed. If they were counted, the official unemployment rate would be much higher" (you often hear this claim from the RepubliCONS when a Democratic president is in the White House, and vice versa when a RepubliCON is in the White House).

# Fact: The count of the unemployed and the unemployment rate is NOT a count of those receiving unemployment benefits, nor is unemployment benefit receiver status factored at all into any of the official national unemployment rate statistics (U1, U2, U3, U4, U5, U6). Rather, the national unemployment rate is based on a survey of 60,000 households chosen at random. See: http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm

"How the Government Measures Unemployment" cps_htgm.htm

and search the page for the word "insurance"

People in the survey are counted as unemployed (and thus part of the official (U3) unemployment rate) if they are jobless and looked for work some time in the past 4 weeks. They are counted as unemployed in the U4, U5, and U6 statistics if they looked for work some time in the past 12 months. It has nothing at all to do with whether they are collecting unemployment benefits or not, or how long they have been unemployed.

However, unemployment insurance data is used as one of the inputs for determining state and substate unemployment rates --

"because the CPS survey of 60,000 households nationwide is insufficient for creating reliable monthly estimates for statewide and substate areas, LAUS (Local Area Unemployment Statistics) uses three different estimating procedures, each being the most appropriate for the level of geography being estimated. In general, estimates for the states are developed using statistical models that incorporate current and historical data from the CPS, the Current Employment Statistics (CES) program, and regular state unemployment insurance (UI) systems. These model-based state estimates are also controlled in "real time" to sum to the not seasonally adjusted national monthly CPS totals."

(also from the above http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm link).

Note the last part -- that the state totals are adjusted to sum up to the national total. So on average, any undercount bias resulting from using (in part) state unemployment insurance (UI) data is eliminated by adjusting the state totals to sum up to the national CPS result (which doesn't use state UI data at all)

---------------------------
However, over the longer term, undoubtedly a cut-off in benefits will affect the unemployment rate numbers, for example:

# People who lose benefits will be more likely to take any job out there, no matter how far below their education, training, and experience, thus lowering the unemployment rate (since they are no longer unemployed).

# Some people who were making some effort to look for work only in order to continue to receive unemployment benefits (looking for work is a requirement to receive benefits) will drop the charade of looking for work when their benefits are cut off. This will also lower the unemployment rate (people who have not looked for work in the last 4 weeks are not counted as unemployed (U-3) or the last 12 months (U-4 - U-6) ). It will also lower the labor force participation rate (officially the labor force is those employed or who have looked for work in the last 4 weeks).

(People in the above category are not necessarily "cheats" in my book -- for example people who may not really be looking right now because they are completing coursework in order to earn a certificate in order to improve their chances of getting a job that utilizes their education and experience is not Reagan's "welfare queen" IMHO)

{#} JOLTS - Job Opening and Labor Turnover Survey

# Job Openings and Labor Turnover SUMMARY - http://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.nr0.htm

# Job Openings and Labor Turnover Table of Contents - http://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.toc.htm

# State Jobs Openings and Labor Turnover Summary (State JOLTS) https://www.bls.gov/news.release/jltst.nr0.htm

# FRED graph of Job Openings, Total NonFarm (JTSJOL) -- https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/JTSJOL

# Job Openings and Labor Turnover Technical Note -- https://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.tn.htm

The job openings are not a count of job postings. They are based on surveys of companies. It is not required that an opening be posted in order for it to be counted.

# This Mahatmakanejeeves thread (JOLTS report for October 2015 that came out December 8) has a graph of Job Openings, Hires, and Quits from January 2001 on, as well as a graph of Reasons Why People Leave Jobs ( Layoffs, Voluntary Quits, Other Separations ) from 2001 on -- http://www.democraticunderground.com/10141283919

# This Mahatmakanejeeves thread (JOLTS report for January 2016 that came out March 17) has a graph of Job Openings, Hires, and Quits from January 2007 on -- http://www.democraticunderground.com/10141283919

# Latest as of 2/7/20 - this one from 1/21/20
https://www.democraticunderground.com/111687284

# Number of unemployed persons per job opening, seasonally adjusted
Interesting graph: it was about 6.4 at the height of the Great Recession and is now about 0.95 (January 2020)
https://www.bls.gov/charts/job-openings-and-labor-turnover/unemp-per-job-opening.htm

{#} Multiple JobHolders

Table A-9: Multiple Jobholders: January 2020: 8,152,000 Percent of employed: 5.1%. -- So according to this and Politifact, it is a myth that most people are working 2 or 3 jobs.
. . . http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t09.htm
. . . Politifact-- https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2018/jul/18/alexandria-ocasio-cortez/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-wrong-several-counts-abou/

This piece from a Forbes contributor explains why the number of multiple job holders might be underestimated by the BLS. (Caution: this is not Forbes' opinion, but rather the contributors' opinion. Right next to the word "contributor" after the author's name (Erik Sherman) is a little info icon. When one clicks on that, it says "Opinions expressed by Forbes contributors are their own".

It's the equivalent of an "op-ed" in say the New York Times and Washington Post where they try to have a variety of opinions to look "balanced" and, well, just to present a variety of opinions.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/eriksherman/2018/07/22/more-people-probably-work-multiple-jobs-than-the-government-realizes/#776e2d002a21

See Table A-9 ( http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t09.htm ) and Table A-16 (http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t09.htm ). Table A-16 has a breakdown into 4 categories: primary job full-time, secondary job part-time, etc. etc. Also by men and women.

# Multiple Job holders, thousands, seasonaly adjusted -
. . . https://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/LNS12026619
. . . http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12026619

# Multiple Jobholders as a Percent of Employed, seasonally adjusted
. . . https://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/LNS12026620
. . . http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12026620

# Multiple Job Holders - Fred -- several breakdowns, each with their BLS timeseries numbers, e.g. LNS12026620
. . . https://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/categories/32450

# http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat36.htm -- is only by year, e.g. 2014, 2015. lots of breakdowns -- by age, by race/ethnicity

# Myth: "But the real unemployment rate is 15% (or 24% or whatever) and it keeps going up":

# Facts: The broadest measure of unemployment rate that the Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes is the U-6 -- Total unemployed, plus all marginally attached workers plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of all civilian labor force plus all marginally attached workers, seasonally adjusted http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS13327709
( Definitions of alternative meausres of unemployment: http://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm )

U-6 counts as unemployed all who have looked for a job sometime, even just once, in the past year, and who are not employed and say they want a job now. And part-time workers who want full-time work. (Whereas the headline official (U-3) unemployment rate counts only those who have looked for work in the past 4 weeks, and counts all part-timers as employed).

The U-6 unemployment rate was 15.4% in January 2009 when Bush left office and Obama took office.
When Obama left office and Trump took office, it was 9.4% (January 2017).
Recently it was 6.9% in January 2020. It had been on a fairly steady decline since about April 2010 (when it peaked at 17.2%). ( LNS13327709 )

There are even broader measures of unemployment to be found on the Internet (where just about anything can be found and dressed up as reasonable) such as the Shadow Stats series unemployment rate. My understanding is that the BLS's U-6 includes people who have looked for a job sometime, even just once, in the past 12 months ( http://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm ). I don't see any particular reason to broaden the definition of unemployment rate to those, who although they say they want a job now, haven't bothered to do any job-hunting for over a year. How far should we extend it?

Should we also count as unemployed the house spouse in a one-high-income household -- or the happily retired person -- who, if an ideal dream job came up, would consider it? See the next item on what if you counted everyone who says they want a job.

If you count everyone who says they want a job, even if they have made no effort to find one in many years...

More specifically if you counted every jobless person who answers "yes" to the question "do you want a job" and every part-time worker that answers "yes" to the question, "do you want a full time job?" (even if they have made no effort to find a job in years), then the unemployment rate is 8.8% as of January 2020 -- This is 1.7 percentage points higher than the BLS's January U-6 unemployment rate of 6.9% ). .

Paul Solman of the PBS Newshour created this "U-7" indicator.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/2011/02/a-disjointed-jobs-report-and-u-7-month-two.html

I don't know how to easily find the latest and past values of this indicator, but try this first: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/tag/solman-scale/ .

If that doesn't work out, to find the latest value, go to the PBS Newshour's "Making Sense" page ( http://www.pbs.org/newshour/making-sense ) and scroll down until you find an article about unemployment and jobs that was posted on the Friday that the jobs report comes out (usually the first Friday of the month). There will be a big graphic of several jobless and job indicators, that includes this "U-7" (later: well, lately the big graphic has been dropped, darn).

For the June 2015 report, I came close (12.80%) to duplicating Paul Solman's U-7 (12.73%) as follows:

(a1.) Unemployed: 8,299,000 (Table A-1) -- these are officially unemployed because they are jobless and looked for work sometime in the past 4 weeks

(a2.) Persons not in labor force but who currently want a job: 6,076,000 (Table A-1) - these are not counted among the officially unemployed because they haven't looked for work sometime in the past 4 weeks

(a3.) Part time for economic reasons: 6,505,000 (Table A-8) -- these are people who are working part-time who want a full-time job

(a4.) Expanded Unemployed: The sum of a1 + a2 + a3 above
` ` ` = 8,299,000 + 6,076,000 + 6,505,000 = 20,880,000

(b1.) (Official) Labor force: 157,037,000 -- this is the employed + officially unemployed

(b2.) Expanded Labor Force = (Official) Labor Force + a2
` ` ` = 157,037,000 + 6,076,000 = 163,113,000
(Note that a3 (part-time for economic reasons) is already included in the (Official) Labor force, so it is included in the above Expanded Labor Force too.

(c1.) Expanded unemployment rate that includes all who want a job, including part-timers who want full time work = Expanded Unemployed / Expanded Labor Force = 20,880,000 / 163,113,000 = 12.80%

(Update: For the August 2015 report, I calculated U-7 as 12.54%, while Solman's number is 12.48%. For the December report, I calculated U-7 as 12.10%, while Solman's number is 12.03%. In July 2016, I calculated 11.86%, while Solman's number is 11.8%. Generally my calculation of U-7 has been a bit higher than Solman's, but less than 0.1% higher. ).

So those who tell you that the "real" unemployment rate is 23% or something like that are pulling your leg. Particulary when someone tries to charge you $89 in order to gain access to web pages where he MIGHT tell you how he comes up with his number.

# Myth: There are 94 million involuntarily unemployed, so the real unemployment rate is about 40%

Using rhetorical gamesmanship, some people (including Trump during the 2016 campaign, but not since becoming president) cite the BLS statistic, "Not In The Labor Force" -- which in September 2016 was a bit over 94 million -- as being "94 million jobless Americans" or "94 million unemployed"; usually in the context of discussing those who have given up looking for work in desperation. (Incidentally, during the course of Trump's presidency, this number has increased from 94.4 million in January 2017 to 94.9 million in January 2020, but of course you don't here anything about this number anymore from Trump or the administration) ( links just below the next paragraph )

Even though the vast majority of these don't want a job now (or ever in some cases). I guess some people just don't think people should ever be full-time students or ever voluntarily retired or ever full-time homemakers or ever take some time out of paid labor for other pursuits.

That statistic comes from http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS15000000

and counts every jobless person 16 and over who has not looked for work in the past 4 weeks. Yes, including full time students. And yes, including the elderly, even centenarians.

There is another statistic that is far more relevant: Not In The Labor Force, Wants Job Now

http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS15026639

In January 2017 (Obama's last month):
94,435,000 Not In Labor Force
5,739,000 Not In Labor Force, Wants Job Now
6.1% Percentage of those not in the labor force who wants a job now

In January 2020
94,896,000 Not In Labor Force
4,904,000 Not In Labor Force, Wants Job Now
5.2% Percentage of those not in the labor force who wants a job now

Note that under Trump, "Not In Labor Force" INcreased by 461,000 (so that's why Trump and the Trumpanzees never mention that number anymore. In the 2016 Trump campaign rhetoric, those were all "jobless Americans" )

(While the more important number, "Not In Labor Force Wants Job Now" decreased by 835,000 )

These statistics are available in Table A-1: http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t01.htm
---or as noted above, from---
# Not In Labor Force: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS15000000
# Not In Labor Force, Wants Job Now: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS15026639

# Myth: In 1994, during the Clinton administration, they stopped counting the long-term unemployed, or the "long term discouraged worker". If we calculated the unemployment rate now the way we did before 1994, the unemployment rate would be double, triple (or whatever. One claimed that the unemployment rate in January 2015 calculated by the old method would be 23% instead of the officially reported 5.7%). This official government document describes the changes made during the Clinton administration: http://www.bls.gov/mlr/1995/10/art3full.pdf

# Facts: First, the changes described in the above document actually increased the official unemployment rate (today's U-3) by about 0.2 percentage points (compared to the old official unemployment rate, then called U-5).

The big changes were in the more lenient alternative definitions of unemployment. The one that is most popular in the media both in the old days and the new days is the most lenient of the alternative ones -- U-7 in the old survey, and U-6 in the new one. (The other alternative measures barely seem to get any attention outside of academia).

Per that document, the definition change of discouraged workers cut the number of officially counted discouraged workers by about 50% in the new U-6 compared to the old U-7, and also decreased the number of part-time workers for economic reasons (part-time workers who want full time work) by about 20%.

I tried to emulate the old U-7 with today's data (well, this was back in early February 2015 using the January 2015 jobs report data) (I doubled the number of marginal workers and increased the part-time for economic reasons by 20%) and found it to be at most 13.4% (I made some simplifications that result in a high-side estimate), compared to the current U-6 at 11.3% (again these are January 2015 jobs reports numbers). So it's not like there is a humongous dramatic difference between the old measure and the new on this most lenient of the unemployment measures.

(January's official unemployment rate (U-3) and alternatives (U-1 thru U-6) are in Table A-15 in http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf )

( Definitions of alternative measures of unemployment: http://www.bls.gov/lau/stalt.htm )

Anyway, its worth emphasizing again that the official unemployment rate (now U-3) was barely altered, actually slightly increased, compared to the old U-5 official definition. And that the changes did not all that dramatically reduce U-6 compared to its old survey U-7 counterpart.

Even counting everyone who says they want a job, period (including part-time workers who want full-time work), the January 2015 unemployment rate was 13.5%, based on Paul Solman's U-7 number for the January 2015 jobs report, http://www.pbs.org/newshour/making-sense/higher-unemployment-rate-may-good-news-economy/ . Update: for January 2020, Paul's U-7 number is 8.8% (my calculation), and the BLS's U-6 number is 6.9%)

More detail about the 1994 Clinton era changes: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10141009906#post67

# Myth: most jobs created during the "so-called recovery" are part-time, especially after Obamacare became law:

# Fact: Since the bottom of the jobs market in February 2010 (coincidentally one month before Obamacare was passed and signed) through the end of the Obama administration:

Part-time workers increased by 264,000 while full-time workers increased by 13,847,000

And no, Obamacare (signed into law March 2010, and first going into effect on a mass scale in January 2014) did not cause a noticable shift from full-time to part-time work.

Part time workers: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12600000
Full time workers: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12500000

Under G.W. Bush, Part-time workers increased by 2,954,000
while full-time workers increased by 1,556,000

Under Obama, Part-time workers increased by 986,000 (Jan '17 minus Jan '09)
while full-time workers increased by 8,807,000 (Jan '17 minus Jan '09)

Seems like if anyone was the part-time president, it was G.W. Bush.

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
Using the BLS's Table A-9 part-time and full-time numbers http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t09.htm
Part-time workers: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12600000
Full-time workers: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12500000

Under Trump, Part-time workers increased by 83,000 thru Jan 2020
while full-time workers increased by 6,536,000 thru Jan 2020

-------------------------------------------------
By the way, the BLS's definition of full-time workers is 35 or more hours/week, while the Obamacare employer mandate for providing healthcare insurance is 30 hours/week. So if all that many employers were moving away from full-time to part-time jobs, it would show up in the above BLS statistics, but sure doesn't seem to. Also, involuntary part-timers has been falling for years ( http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12032194 ).

# Myth: "Those payroll job creation numbers the corporate media reports are just that: jobs created. They don't mention all of the jobs that were lost. To get the true picture, they should report the NET jobs created: jobs created less jobs lost":

# Facts: The number headlined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the media is the NET jobs created.

You can see a count of total nonfarm employment in thousands -- http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001

So for example in January 2018 the table displayed at the above link shows there were 147,767 thousand (i.e. 147.767 million) nonfarm employees, and in February 2018 there were 148,097 thousand (i.e. 148.097 million). The media and the BLS reports the difference (148,097 thousand - 147,767 thousand) = 330,000 as the total jobs created in Feburary. So this is a net number.

At the same link, you can see the monthly differences by clicking on the "More Formatting Options" big blue link near the upper right of the page, and in the box in the upper left side of the page that appears, you will see the "Original Data Value" checkbox checked. Additionally, check the "1-month Net Change" checkbox. Then click the "Retrieve Data" button below it.

On the page that appears, you will see the table described in the paragraph above (the total number of nonfarm employees in thousands) followed by a table of the monthly changes in these numbers. For example, it will show the February 2018 employee count change as being 330,000 -- that is 330,000 employees higher than in February.

(Or click this link just to see the monthly changes: http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001?output_view=net_1mth)

# Myth: "The unemployment rate is low because so many people are working two or more jobs, and working 60, 70, 80 hours a week ":

# Facts: The unemployment rate is not based on comparing the working age population to the number of jobs. Rather, the unemployment rate is based on a monthly survey of 60,000 households (comprising an average of about 110,000 individuals age 16 and over -- with no upper limit in age, e.g. even centenarians are included). The age-16-and-over individuals are asked a series of questions, from which their employment status is determined, e.g. employed (and whether holding multiple jobs, and whether part-time or full-time), or unemployed, or not in the labor force, etc.

See: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wrong on several counts about unemployment, Politifact, 7/18/18 ( https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2018/jul/18/alexandria-ocasio-cortez/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-wrong-several-counts-abou/ )

When the BLS determines the unemployment rate, a person is counted as employed as long as they have at least one job. They don’t get counted twice if they have two jobs. So Ocasio-Cortez is wrong in saying multiple job holding and long hours affect the unemployment rate.

The number of multiple job holders is only a small fraction -- about 5% -- of the total number of employed.

Table A-9: Multiple Jobholders: January 2019: 7,850,000 Percent of employed: 5.0%.
. . . http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t09.htm

# Multiple Jobholders Level (thousands): https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12026619
# Multiple Jobholders as a Percent of Total Employed: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12026620

See also the "Multiple JobHolders" section above.

For more details, see the Bureau of Labor Statistics' "How the Government Measures Unemployment" ( https://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm )

# Myth: "The ADP jobs numbers are much more reliable than the Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers because the ADP are actual payroll numbers, whereas the BLS numbers are 'just a survey' "

The ADP numbers cover only about 20% of the nation's private workforce.
https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/speech/powell20191008a.htm

the ADP National Employment Report and ADP Small Business Report are derived from ADP payroll data representing 460,000 U.S. clients and nearly 26 million workers
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/september-2021-adp-national-employment-121500533.html

Google: ADP vs. Bureau of labor statistics job numbers

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# Myth: "There was a big 225,000 increase in nonfarm payroll jobs, and yet the unemployment rate went up. This proves they are cooking the books, and the corporate media is playing along with their game"

The two can diverge because the nonfarm payroll jobs ( https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001?output_view=net_1mth ) and the unemployment rate ( http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000 ) come from two different surveys.

The unemployment rate comes from the Household Survey (CPS) http://www.bls.gov/cps/,

and the payroll jobs numbers comes from the Establishment Survey (CES) ( http://www.bls.gov/ces/ ). They often widely diverge, and the household survey is much more volatile and lower accuracy.

For example here are the two compared from January 2018 through January 2020,

Monthly changes for Non-farm payroll employment from the Establishment Survey, thousands
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/CES0000000001?output_view=net_1mth
2018 121 406 176 137 278 219 136 244 80 201 134 182
2019 269 1 147 210 85 182 194 207 208 185 261 147(P)
2020 225(P)
P : preliminary
(Yup, that's a "1" in February 2019, meaning only 1,000 net jobs created that month ... I had to look at it again)

Monthly changes for "Employed" from the Household Survey, thousands
https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11000000?output_view=net_1mth
2018 530 715 -99 58 132 395 -96 -405 310 527 57 449
2019 31 -95 -112 -389 236 351 240 521 157 350 -54 209
2020 50
January and February data of every year is affected by changes in population controls.

So for January 2020, the nonfarm payroll jobs number increased by 225,000 while the "Employed" (Household Survey) increased by only 50,000.

Again, the unemployment rate comes from the Household Survey.

Anyway that's one of the main reasons for the two to diverge big time. Another is the number of people who decide to look for a job. Only people who have looked for work in the past 4 weeks are counted as unemployed in the official (U3) unemployment statistics. So a surge in the number of people who start looking for work in the last 4 weeks -- perhaps because of a perceived improving job market -- can cause the unemployment rate to go up.

Jack Welch famously made an enormous hoo hah back in 2012 when the unemployment rate went up one month while there was a big number of new jobs reported, accusing Obama's libruh bureaucrats and frightened minions of cooking the numbers. But we're smart enough not to fall for it, according to Jack Welch and the right wing media at the time. (Actually a divergence between the job count change and the unemployment rate happens often).

      About cooked numbers

What I've found is that if there is some angle showing that Obama's record is better than Trump's, people quote the numbers as if they are divinely-revealed truth. For example, I've seen innumerable examples all over DU, pointing out that Obama has created more jobs in his last 3 years than Trump has in his 3 years so far, including a Pic Of The Moment, to cite one of many. https://www.democraticunderground.com/1017567831

What I've also found is that in the months when the job numbers are poor, such as February and May of 2019, people quote the numbers as if they are divinely-revealed truth proving that we're headed for a recession.

But in months where the job numbers are good, then the conspiracy theorists come out, and we're all naive ignoramuses not to see that we're being played. (Que Art Bell theme music).