Econ 201 Unemployment

Lecture slides

"Don't believe those phony numbers!"

Notes on Unemployment

Labor markets

• • Bureau of Labor Statistics Glossary

• Unemployment rate

  • • Unemployed for 15 weeks or longer - By far the worst since we started computing this in the late 1940a

    • Median duration of unemployment - Far worse than at any time since we started computing this stat in the 1960s

    • Long-term unemployment? Still pretty high.

• Labor Force Participation Rate: Thank you ladies for that amazing economic growth from 1960 to 1990

• • LFPR = (Working or looking for work)/(Working age population)

  • Stunning graphic of unemployment change over time by region of the US (VisualCapitalist.com)

Articles about unemployment

• • Measuring Unemployment - It all began in 1878. (David Leonhardt, New York Times, May 5, 2008)

  • Alternative measures of unemployment: U1, U2, U3, U4, U5, U6 (Bureau of Labor Statistics, BLS)

  • Pictures of Structural Unemployment

  • How does the government count job losses? (Slate, Nov. 7, 2009)

For amusement:

• • Good labor market news...from the Onion.