The U.S. lost 563,000 jobs in April, down 100,000 or so from the 663,000 jobs lost in March. But the unemployment rate continued to rise, increasing from 8.5 percent in March to 8.9 percent last month. according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). This brings total job loss to 5.7 million since the onset of the recession in December 2007. (Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal reported reported that unemployment was “less bad” in April as private companies cut 491,000 jobs, compared to 708,000 in March, according to data from payroll processor Automatic Data Processing and forecasting firm Macroeconomic Advisers.)
But the real unemployment rate is as high as 15.8 percent according to the BLS U6 measure which includes marginally attached and discouraged workers.
The impact of the recession continues to be extremely uneven by gender, race, class, and occupation.
Race: The unemployment rate for whites was eight percent compared to 11.3 percent for Hispanics, 15 percent for blacks, and 17.2 percent for black men.
Gender: Men continue to experience higher rates of unemployment than women – 10 percent vs. 7.6 percent (for those over 16 years of age) – due to the concentration of men in manufacturing jobs. BusinessWeek’s Michael Mandel notes that the unemployment rate among men is now “at or near the post-war high,” causing him to worry that, “The difference in the pain being absorbed by men and women is astonishing, and may have long-term social and political implications.”
Education/ Human Capital: Unemployment is even more uneven by education or human capital level. The unemployment rate for college graduates is 4.4 percent, half that for high school (only) graduates (9.3 percent), and one-third of the 14.8 percent rate facing those without a high school diploma.
Class and Occupation: And there remain huge differences in unemployment by class or occupation (PDF). The highest rates of unemployment remain concentrated in working class occupations – production workers (14.7 percent), movers and transportation workers (12.5 percent), and construction and extraction jobs (19.7 percent). For service class workers the unemployment rate is 8.7 percent. Unemployment is significantly lower for the creative class. For management and business occupations – including hard-fit financial jobs – the unemployment rate is 4.4 percent; and for professional and technical occupations, it remains less than four percent (3.6 percent).
May 9th, 2009 at 4:54 pm
Is this a deep, keynesian recession, a financial panic, or a reset from the end of an economic era?
May 9th, 2009 at 6:14 pm
Questions: when I was an unemployed manager (for 3 months), I did not bother to file for unemployment benefit. Would I have been counted in the BLS statistics?
RF, if you were unemployed, would you file for unemployment benefit?
If not, this suggests that “Management …”
unemployment is under-represented in these graphs.
May 9th, 2009 at 9:20 pm
Nate Silver’s take on this is worth reading:
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/05/horray-second-derivative-of.html
May 10th, 2009 at 10:56 am
Steve, I’d charaterize this recession as one which recovery will be at a GDP that falls short of past years’ numbers. And I think the old economy that put too much value on growth growth will be replaced by one that values earnings over growth. Much of the credit that pushed the economy is unavailable, and home equity to borrow against is gone. Growth got us chain drugstores on every corner without concern that demand might not support them all.
We can never go back to the easy credit past and therefore cannot expect to see GDP equal to 2005 levels until population expans enough to support pruduction and demand at that level. When we “recover,” there will be perhaps a permanent 5% hit to GDP without HELOCS and liar loans.
But before a real recovery takes hold, look for a second round of residential real estate losses from Alt. A and Prime borrowers, record credit card defaults and a historic hit to commercial real estate, all of which will stress banks anew. And we may not have he ability to finance those losses through TARPs if we can’t find buyers of our debt.
I think American reliance on foreign money to finance our debt is a major weakness that could eventually lead to a real depression. We need record low rates on US treasuries to get by, and that will only happen as long as those treauries are attractive relative to other investment vehicles. If other economies begin to recover first, capital will move out of both our equities and bond markets, leaving us unable to bail out banks and industry, even unable to finance government debt, much less pay for a recovery.
May 10th, 2009 at 11:56 pm
Mike L, If I’m not mistaken one of the BLS methodologies for calculating who is unemployed is a telephone survey. So, someone unemployed but not claiming benefits would still be counted as unemployed, assuming they answered truthfully.
Of course, truth is in the eye of the beholder.
In Canada this past month we had the equivalent study (LFS) show a big jump in “self employment,” particularly among men over age 55. This may be experienced, senior people choosing to try to make it as a consultant rather than go on benefits.
October 2nd, 2010 at 1:24 pm
I tend to believe that the biggest problem in regards to bad credit is deeper than what is seen on the surface. I believe the problem is actually as much emotional as it is financial. Where there is overspending, not only is there a financial gap, but an emotional one as well that needs to be focused on Just something to think about