Unemployment Rates Under President Obama
When Obama assumed office, the unemployment rate was still rising sharply. It topped out at 10 percent in October 2009, hovering just below that level for the next year, before beginning a steady decline at the end of 2010 that has persisted into early-2016 and breaking through the 5 percent mark at the beginning of 2016.
Unemployment Rate And Covid
In response to pandemic-related closures or business cutbacks, unemployment in the United States achieved historic records. In May 2020, 49.8 million individual reported they had been unable to work at some point in the prior four weeks because their employer closed or lost business due to the pandemic. The unemployment rate increased from 4.4% in March 2020 to 14.8% in April 2020, achieving levels not seen since the 1930s.
The impacts of COVID-19 were experienced across the nation, as every state in the United States experienced a higher unemployment rate than what was recorded during the Great Recession. However, unemployment rates disproportionally impacted different sectors:
- Financial Activities: The unemployment rate in May 2020 was 5.7%, while the unemployment rate in July 2021 had improved to 3.0%.
- Leisure and Hospitality: The unemployment rate in April 2020 was 39.3%, while the unemployment rate in July 2021 had improved to 9.0%.
- Wholesale and Retail: The unemployment rate in April 2020 was 17.1%, while the unemployment rate in July 2021 had improved to 6.0%.
Demographics And Employment Trends
Employment trends can be analyzed by any number of demographic factors individually or in combination, such as age, gender, educational attainment, and race. A major trend underlying the analysis of employment numbers is the aging of the white workforce, which is roughly 70% of the employment total by race as of November 2016. For example, the prime working age white population declined by 4.8 million between December 2007 and November 2016, roughly 5%, while non-white populations are increasing. This is a major reason why non-white and foreign-born workers are increasing their share of the employed. However, white prime-age workers have also had larger declines in labor force participation than some non-white groups, for reasons not entirely clear. Such changes may have important political implications.
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The Construction And Manufacturing Industries Were Hit With The Highest Levels Of Unemployment During The Great Recession
Its common for goods-producing industries to encounter significant employment dips during recessions. The Great Recession was no different, where construction employment declined by 13.7% and manufacturing declined by 10%.
Employment in the financial activities sector dropped by 3.9%, whereas education and health services actually saw employment increases during this time. In fact, employment in education and health services has decreased in only one of the 12 recessions since 1945.
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A0: Summary Of Employment Unemployment And Economic Inactivity For People Below State Pension Age
Labour market summary for people below state pension age. Estimates in this table follow the incremental increase in the female state pension age each quarter. These estimates are not the headline labour force survey estimates – they are shown at Tables A02 SA and A02 NSA. This table is updated four times a year in February, May, August and November. These estimates are sourced from the Labour Force Survey, a survey of households.
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Not Included In The Data
The data does not include estimates based on fewer than:
- 30 survey respondents for data covering all ethnic groups together
- 100 survey respondents for data broken down by ethnicity
This is to protect peopleâs confidentiality and because the numbers involved are too small to make reliable generalisations.
What’s The Difference Between U
U-3 is the headline unemployment number that we see in the news. It looks at those out-of-work Americans who have been looking for a job within the past four weeks. The more comprehensive U-6 includes everyone in U-3 plus those with only temporary work and people who are considered marginally attached to the labor force. These include those who have stopped looking for a job, as well as part-time workers unable to work full-time for economic reasons.
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Employment Policies And The Minimum Wage
Advocates of raising the minimum wage assert this would provide households with more money to spend, while opponents recognize the impact this has on businesses’, especially small businesses’, ability to pay additional workers. Critics argue raising employment costs deters hiring. During 2009, the minimum wage was $7.25 per hour, or $15,000 per year, below poverty level for some families. The New York Times editorial board wrote in August 2013: “As measured by the federal minimum wage, currently $7.25 an hour, low-paid work in America is lower paid today than at any time in modern memory. If the minimum wage had kept pace with inflation or average wages over the past nearly 50 years, it would be about $10 an hour if it had kept pace with the growth in average labor productivity, it would be about $17 an hour.”
The Economist wrote in December 2013: “A minimum wage, providing it is not set too high, could thus boost pay with no ill effects on jobs…America’s federal minimum wage, at 38% of median income, is one of the rich world’s lowest. Some studies find no harm to employment from federal or state minimum wages, others see a small one, but none finds any serious damage.”
The U.S. minimum wage was last raised to $7.25 per hour in July 2009. As of December 2013, there were 21 states with minimum wages above the Federal minimum, with the State of Washington the highest at $9.32. Ten states index their minimum wage to inflation.
Major Rebenchmarking Of Labour Force Estimates
In the November 2022 publication, to be released on 15 December 2022, the Labour Force population benchmarks will be updated to reflect the latest estimated resident population based on the 2021 Census .
This is a regular 5-yearly rebasing process which follows each Census, and ensures the Labour Force estimates are benchmarked to the most recent population information.
This process will result in revisions to Labour Force estimates going back to 2016. This follows a similar process to that undertaken in 2017.
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A Strong National Economy Helps All Metropolitan Areas Even Those With Persistently High Unemployment Rates
Figure 4 plots the distribution of the unemployment rate by metropolitan area from 2005 to 2018, with dots of different colors and sizes identifying the quartiles of the unemployment rate distribution in 2006, as in Figure 2.
There are several phenomena that can be observed in this graph. One is the central tendency of the metropolitan area unemployment ratesas a whole, are the unemployment rates relatively high or low in a given yearwhich reflects the state of the business cycle. The second is how disperse the unemployment rates areare the unemployment rates across the metropolitan areas relatively similar or are they spread out, with some areas having high rates and others relatively low rates. And the third is the relative position of the unemployment rates of specific metropolitan areasdo metropolitan areas that have high or low unemployment rates to start remain in those positions over the entire time period. To help elucidate these points, we also show the mean, range, and variance of the unemployment rates for groups of years in Table 1.
Us Job Growth Strong In October But Cracks Emerging
WASHINGTON – U.S. job growth increased more than expected in October, but the pace is slowing and the unemployment rate rose to 3.7%, suggesting some loosening in labor market conditions, which would allow the Federal Reserve to shift towards smaller interest rates increases starting in December.
The Labor Department’s closely watched unemployment report on Friday also showed annual wages increasing at their slowest pace in just over a year last month. Household employment decreased and the employment-to-population ratio, viewed as a measure of an economy’s ability to create employment, for prime-age workers fell by the most in 2-1/2 years.
“The foundation of the labor market strength story fades a little when you pull back the tarp and look more closely at the details,” said Christopher Rupkey, chief economist at FWDBONDS in New York. “The report to us looks like payroll jobs growth will falter in coming months as companies batten down the hatches as the Fed continues to take away the economy’s punch.”
The survey of establishments showed nonfarm payrolls increased 261,000 last month, the smallest gain since December 2020. Data for September was revised higher to show 315,000 jobs added instead of 263,000 as previously reported.
The government said Hurricane Ian, which lashed Florida and the Carolinas in late September, “had no discernible effect on the national employment and unemployment data for October.”
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Government As The Employer Of Last Resort
The government could also become the employer of last resort, just as central banks are the lenders of last resort. A job guarantee would maintain labor market stability and could establish full employment. This would introduce a shock absorber into the labor market. Full employment might also gain wider support among the electorate than a basic income policy.
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Which State Has The Highest Unemployment Rate
Based on the latest monthly jobs report from the BLS, that of December 2021, the state with the highest unemployment rate is California, with an unemployment rate of 6.5%. Looking at the annual average unemployment rate for 2021, California also ranks as the state with the highest unemployment rate at 7.7%, but its tied with Nevada and Hawaii, who both had annual average unemployment rates of 7.7% for 2021.
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Detroit Evening Report: Unemployment Rate In Detroit Matches 20
Welcome to the Detroit Evening Report, a daily round-up of news that city residents need to know.
Mayor Mike Duggan announced Thursday that the city of Detroits unemployment rate has fallen to 7 percent, the lowest in over 20 years.
According to the National Bureau of Labor Statistics September 2022 Employment Data Report, the unemployment rate is down from 12.5 percent last year. This matches the lowest rate Detroit has seen since September 2000.
Officials attributed lower unemployment to continued development and investment in the city and its workforce. Detroits unemployment rate spiked to more than 38 percent in May 2020, two months into the COVID-19 pandemic in the U.S.
Duggan and officials say theyre confident the momentum will continue as more development comes to the area.
Detroit at Work, the citys workforce development program, works to create career opportunities for residents of all skill levels. Since January of this year, Detroit at Work has held 61 job fairs, with more than 10,000 people in attendance.
Other headlines for November 3, 2022:
- Detroit awards more than $500,000 in Neighborhood Beautification Program grants
- Runners head to SW Detroit for Run for the Dead race this weekend
- Wayne State places athletic director on administrative leave
- Pistons host Cleveland Friday night at LCA
Although Metropolitan Areas Experiencing Idiosyncratic Shocks Undergo Large Changes In Their Unemployment Rates They Tend To Revert Back To Their Previous Place In The Distribution:
In addition to the persistent characteristics that shape the economies of metropolitan areas over long periods, idiosyncratic events specific to metropolitan areas can also have a significant impact. Examples of these types of shocks include storms, like Hurricane Katrina, which reshaped New Orleans, or technical changes such as hydraulic fracturing, which made it possible to extract oil and gas from areas where they were previously inaccessible. These idiosyncratic shocks may or may not have long-lasting impacts.
Figure 3 shows the distribution of metropolitan area unemployment rates over a fourteen-year period. The figure highlights five metropolitan areas. In 2006 these highlighted areas were in the first quartile of the distribution meaning that these areas had lower levels of unemployment than 75 percent of the metropolitan areas displayed in the figure. By 2009, these five areas had unemployment rates that were in the top quartile of the distribution that year. While it is true that the unemployment rate on aggregate was also rising during this period , these areas were affected earlier and by morea function of the fact that they were hit by a specific, negative idiosyncratic shock: the bursting of the housing bubble. These metropolitan areas are located in Florida and Nevada, states with large housing bubbles, and the specific metropolitan areas highlighted experienced large drops in local housing prices when the bubble burst in 2007.
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President’s Council On Jobs And Competitiveness
President Obama established the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness in 2009. The Council released an interim report with a series of recommendations in October 2011. The report included five major initiatives to increase employment while improving competitiveness:
Influencing Factors On The Us Unemployment Rate
There are a number of factors that influence the unemployment rate in the United States, including the number of people leaving the workforce, hiring rates, and economic growth. The current pandemic has had a significant impact on unemployment rates as well, with many businesses shutting down or reducing hours. In November 2009, there were 25.2 million unemployed workers nationwide, but by December 2010 this number was up to 27.5 million. From January 2007 to July 2011, the unemployment rate increased from 4.4% to 9.1%. After reaching its peak at 10.0% in October 2009, it fell to 8.6% in June 2011 before rising again over the next two months . According to data compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, approximately 45 percent of unemployed individuals have been without work for 27 weeks or more .
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Articles And Other Information
The ABS has again included more detailed information given the interest in understanding
- hours worked and comparisons with the labour market before the monthly Labour Force Survey commenced in 1978.
This detailed information can be found in:
For a list of previously published LFS articles, see the Article archive.
The ABS is also continuing to include data cubes EM2a and EM2b in this release. These two data cubes are usually only released in Labour Force, Australia, Detailed, but will continue to be released in the headline release over the coming months, to enable more detailed analysis of changes in hours worked and the reasons that people are working reduced or no hours.
Additional spreadsheets and pivot tables are published in Labour Force, Australia, Detailed one week after this release, while longitudinal labour force microdata are released in the ABS DataLab, on 28 October 2022 .
Effect Of Disability Recipients On Labor Force Participation Measures
The number of people receiving Social Security disability benefits increased from 7.1 million in December 2007 to 8.7 million in April 2012, a 22% increase. Recipients are excluded from the labor force. Economists at JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Morgan Stanley estimated this explained as much as 0.5 of the 2.0 percentage point decline in the U.S. labor-force participation rate during the period.
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Why Is Inflation Still So High
Much of what we’re seeing in the economy right now can be attributed to the pandemic. In March 2020, the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic caused the US economy to shut down. Millions of employees were laid off, many businesses had to close their doors and the global supply chain was abruptly put on pause. This caused the flow of goods produced and manufactured abroad and shipped to the US to cease for at least two weeks, and in many cases, for months, according to Pete Earle, an economist at the American Institute for Economic Research.
But the reduction in supply was met with increased demand as Americans started purchasing durable goods to replace the services they used prior to the pandemic, said Josh Bivens, director of research at the Economic Policy Institute. “The pandemic put distortions on both the demand and supply side of the US economy,” Bivens said.
Though the immediate impacts of COVID-19 on the US economy are easing, labor disruptions and supply-and-demand imbalances persist, including shortages in microchips, steel, equipment and other goods, causing ongoing slowdowns in manufacturing and construction. Unanticipated shocks to the global economy have made things worse — particularly subsequent COVID-19 variants, lockdowns in China and Russia’s war on Ukraine , according to the World Bank.
Some lawmakers have also accused corporations of seizing on inflation as an excuse to increase prices more than necessary, a form of price gouging.
Metropolitan Areas Tend To Have Similar Unemployment Rates Over Time
As has been well documented, the economies of metropolitan areas vary in structural ways, for instance based on their industrial mix, geography, demographics, and infrastructure. These structural differences result in persistent differences in labor market outcomes, including unemployment rates.
In Figure 2, we examine the persistence of the unemployment rate by metropolitan area. Each dot represents a metropolitan area, and dots are color coded according to their quartile in the distribution of unemployment rates in 2006. The x-axis denotes the metropolitan areas unemployment rate in 2006 and the y-axis the areas unemployment rate in 2018. These are both years at which the economy was near, but not at its peak.
Figure 2 shows a clear, positive relationship between unemployment rates in 2006 and 2018: lower unemployment rates in 2006 are associated with lower unemployment rates in 2018. Notably this relationship holds across the entire sample, and also within the unemployment rate quartiles. Our results suggest that a 1 percentage point higher unemployment rate in 2006 is associated with a 0.6 percentage point higher unemployment rate in 2018. Moreover, the unemployment rate in 2006 explains 44 percent of the variation in the unemployment rate in 2018.
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