Job Search Takes LONGEST In Michigan, South Carolina, Florida

Economic Policy Institute:

Along with the highest rates of unemployment in a generation, the current recession has been characterized by record levels of long-term unemployment. In April, the median length of unemployment in the United States was 21.6 weeks, up from 15.1 weeks in 2009 and well over double the median unemployment spell of 8.4 weeks at the start of the recession in December 2007. The Map shows the median length of unemployment by state in 2009, the most recent time for which state-level data are available. It shows that job searches were taking the longest in Michigan and South Carolina (19.4 weeks), followed by Florida (18.1 weeks), and Rhode Island (17.0 weeks). States where job searches were shortest include Alaska, North Dakota, and Wyoming, where the median length of unemployment was slightly less than eight weeks in 2009.

Read the whole story: Economic Policy Institute

Comments

[PALFEY]

12:13 AM on 06/02/2010

"Ya' just gotta' pull yourself up by the ol' bootsraps" - Sarah Palin

[DebtNavigation]

02:19 PM on 06/01/2010

Why do unemployment benefits keep getting extended?
Here's your answer:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonus_Army

What is the measure of unemployment that includes duration? The "Manchester Index" ... it's half again higher than its previous peak in 1982.

Also, since 1982, jobs have not come back after recessions (it was different from the '50s to '82).

The solution is not anger, the solution is to DO something. Start your own business, get a job in a different industry, work to vote out congresscritters and other politicians whose policies are not helping the situation.

[sueinmn]

01:09 PM on 05/31/2010

The median weeks to find a job~~~BS!

The amount of 99ers is proof that these statistics are off! 40% of the unemployed are or have run out of UI. So how does this 19 weeks or the various numbers they toot, fit?

What is REALLY the truth about unemployment?

[hardcoremama]

09:48 PM on 05/30/2010

Living in the south has taught me 2 things, its hot and humid. I'm finding the comments interesting, people are saying this and that, but no one is saying anything that makes any sense; a lot of pointing fingers, blame and name calling, yet I don't hear any solutions, besides more or less government, Republicans, Democrats, yada yada yada yada. What can be done? How about we change our thinking, how about we come up with ways to provide for our communities in need and an open exchange of ideas. Because we are ALL affected by the drastic changes that are happening in our country, yes it makes me angry, yes I want to rant, rave, scream and blame the other guy. But who is befitting from all my yelling? No one and nothing is changing, its like we're all standing in line just waiting, waiting, waiting. I think we should stop standing and start acting.

[DFL]

09:08 PM on 05/30/2010

I see the job searches are shortest up in america's siberia, but who wants to live up there with those long cold winters?

[WriterGirl]

12:28 AM on 05/28/2010

Whodathunkit? California and the Deep South have something in common after all!

[FairProgressive]

11:54 PM on 05/27/2010

huge surprise that the most liberal are the states draining the rest of us. which just all happen lecture us on how backward the rest of the fly over states are and thing unions are a good thing

not even the slap of reality will wake a liberal up........pathetic

[BigSlick674]

01:59 AM on 05/28/2010

Its the other way around. Your subsidies are still flowing from the Blue States. All through the Bush years, for every dollar you put in the Fed, you got $1.19 back, while the liberal States were only receiving .81 cents back. We kept you on your farm, you better thank us.

[Tinsdale]

10:59 AM on 05/28/2010

Thank you! Well said.

[Janine547]

07:17 PM on 05/31/2010

B.S. ! Then explain California ?

[moose and squirrel]

02:04 AM on 05/28/2010

no, you are reading it wrong. the liberal states' economic engines have been idle, thus dragging the economy down. but once the economy recovers, they will be back on top. one thing for you to think of. as the largest recipients of federal dollars, what are the red states going to do now that the blue states wont be sending enough money to the treasury. why dont they get out and start being truly self-sustaining instead of being propped up by federal dollars that originated in 'liberal socialist' states?

[santiago sherwood]

01:50 PM on 05/28/2010

I have not seen a place with such a dead economy as here in Oregon, 5 years ago it was a startup central, now I have not seen a start up since 2007.

[MuchMadness]

11:11 PM on 05/27/2010

Must be all those labor unions in SC that are to blame.
Doggone libruls takin' over the gummint.

[drbob601]

10:30 PM on 05/27/2010

Funny, out here in San Diego, I read articles telling me that home prices went UP last month...even though CA is one of the states with the highest unemployment rate (12.6% last I heard) and one with the longest median length of unemployment.

Just yesterday, I noticed on foreclosure.com that 710 more NODs were filed in SD county. Throw 'em on the pile, I guess...on top of >550 last week, >700 the week before, >600 the week before that, etc., etc. With so many folks unemployed - and/or not even bothering to pay their mortgages - I guess it makes perfect sense that real estate prices are headed north again. I mean, after all, it's really sunny out here!

Then again, maybe it has something to do with the billions of dollars that the Fed government printed just recently to help with the "real estate crisis" in the five "hardest-hit" states. Thank God these folks in their $600K-dollar houses won't be kicked out into the streets....that would be tragic. Let's just pay their mortgages for them. Money well spent!

[sandiegoconservative]

02:04 AM on 05/28/2010

At least some of us can attempt to buy during this time and take advantge of deals.

[dansup]

03:01 AM on 05/28/2010

seems to me the banks (in part thanks to the taxpayers largese) are holding on to most of these properties so that prices don't tank, and people are living well over a year in homes they haven't made payments on

[coolaid8]

10:30 AM on 05/28/2010

Prices on the 20 homes that actually sold were higher than average - that's good enough for a government statistician.

[themodernleader]

08:02 PM on 05/27/2010

We are in a failing economic system. Private enterprise is in intensive care. And the bankers are the only private citizens getting fat. Most of the other enterprises have either expired or gone to China.
Our leaders are in a borrowing-induced trance. Borrow, lend and spend. Now all this is coming to an end. And the party's over. And the Nation continues its incipient decline.

[General Public]

02:49 AM on 05/28/2010

Fanned for your many thoughtful comments. Although I don't always agree with your other comments, you are doing your part for a more cogent and rational civil discourse, and you are correct about things more often than not, especially in your critiques of our financial system and how it has corrupted our politicians.

[themodernleader]

09:59 PM on 05/31/2010

I try to have at least one slaient idea every five comments. Most of what I read here and elsewhere may have a worthwhile idea every ten thousand words.. Most of the knowledge that is being bandied around is irrelevant or trash knowledge that benefits a targeted previleged few at the expense of the Nation. Thank you for your clear mindedness and generousity.

[zakwouldhave]

05:30 PM on 05/29/2010

I agree with your bleak outlook and most are in denial that most enterprises have "expired or gone to China"....but I don't blame it all on the leaders. Seems the country was living the high life on a house of cards (mostly credit cards) thinking it would last forever. Folly!

[bluejoni2525]

07:49 PM on 05/27/2010

I can't believe NJ is on there !! Things were I live have gotten significantly better for employment, our houses are selling at very good prices and people are definitely shopping, unless our new Repub gov ruins things we should be OK !!!

[coolaid8]

10:31 AM on 05/28/2010

Perhaps it's because of him?

[sueinmn]

07:26 PM on 05/27/2010

So we know we are out of work and possibly millions will never go back to the same type of employment.

Problem being Congress refuses to bail out the people any longer and now what are we to do?

Losing UI means
losing your home- or rental
losing your vehicle
losing your electricity and water
losing your insurance-HC, auto and other
defaulting on credit-there-for losing your credit
losing your childrens -everything they have known
losing even a daily meal on the table with absolutely no income coming in and no jobs to supply the millions out of work.
We can give amnesty to illegals who came here illegally to have a US born child and to have financial gain yet we allow our own to fall to homelessness and ruin all hopes of future employment with damages done as a result.

[textynn]

07:39 PM on 05/27/2010

Hey we have to take care of our Elite. They might lose one of their mansions. Can you imagine how embarrassing it must be not to be able to book the Rolling Stones for your party. Come on. Learn to live vicariously and shut the F up. You kids should be where god intended them to be...behind a McDonald's cash register or better yet, a machine gun . What's wrong with you.

[coolaid8]

10:33 AM on 05/28/2010

And yet we have our soldiers building homes and new infrastructure in Iraq and Afghanistan.

[ghee99]

06:54 PM on 05/27/2010

by and large, with a few exceptions

it looks like republican states are (by far) doing the best

and the most liberal, big spending states are hardest hit

i wonder why that is?

hmmmmmmm

[batmancw]

07:00 PM on 05/27/2010

Well, I live in GA, which is one of those "exceptions" you reference.
I'm starting to see SOME small signs of a turnaround, but there are still totally empty strip malls all around where i live, which was one of the 2 fastest growing population areas in the country just a few years back. Now that all these folks have moved here, they can't find a job!
Pretty Sad

[textynn]

07:39 PM on 05/27/2010

You mean like CA?

[ghee99]

10:59 PM on 05/27/2010

exactly

just like CA

you nailed it on the head, my friend!

[Pammy1151]

05:36 PM on 05/27/2010

I live in Florida. Things seem to be getting a little better here. For the last couple of years not much tourist traffic but they were all back this year. Also there were no jobs in my area which is a big tourist area and now as I drive around I see the HIRING signs back up. Slowly but hopefully surely. There was a period here when even McDonalds wasn't hiring. That is real bad news for this area.

[ECB]

05:46 PM on 05/27/2010

Isn't Central Fl. still taking it on the chin ?

[ghee99]

01:09 AM on 05/28/2010

well, your low state taxes are what saved you, i would bet

i live in CA, highest taxes in the nation,

and we should be getting better, but things are getting worse

and spending in still completely out of control

we are so dependent on taxes, that we could never abolish our state income tax

as such, we are doomed to fail, whereas i see hope for you, Florida

[Higgs Boson]

02:59 AM on 05/28/2010

imagine that , government spending dependent on taxes .............. I guess the money fairy didn't show this year

[Nuyorican21]

08:37 AM on 05/28/2010

Florida has a lot of older senior citizens with fixed incomes and pensions, plenty of Federal money coming into the state at a steady rate. But its going to consumers (as opposed to banks) which will always provide a steady market.

[berrycooda]

04:16 PM on 05/27/2010

I still say that it should be "mandatory" that anything for our Military be made in the U.S.
The Gov't gives out the contracts....give them to Americans.
Even if it costs a little more, people will be working and paying taxes into the system.....
Worked before....Saw something on news that there was a recall on helmets....Another reason to make them here.