Unemployment Rate (Age-Adjusted) Has Been Above 10 Percent For Past Year

The current jobs crisis long ago surpassed all previous recessions in terms of jobs lost, but the national unemployment rate has not risen higher than it did during the dive of the early 1980s, when unemployment hovered above 10 percent for 10 months.

Accounting for the aging of the labor force since then, however, reveals a modern-day workforce weaker than the numbers suggest -- and an unemployment rate higher than at any point since the Great Depression, according to a new report by David Rosnick, an economist with the progressive Center for Economic and Policy Research.

"An unemployment rate that has hovered above 9 percent for several months is striking, but the jobs picture is even worse than it looks," said Rosnick in a statement.

Younger workers' share of the workforce has fallen from just under 24 percent to just under 14 percent in the past 30 years, according to Rosnick's analysis of Labor Department data. Unemployment among workers younger than 25 has consistently been much, much higher than among older workers.

If today's labor force had the age composition it did nearly 30 years ago, the national unemployment rate would be much higher in every month of the last year.

"After adjusting for the aging of the population since the early 1980s, the current labor-market
downturn has resulted in both a higher unemployment rate and a longer period when the rate of unemployment remained over 10 percent," says the report. "On the same age-adjusted basis, the unemployment rate has been over ten percent for thirteen consecutive months, including five months over 11.0 percent and reaching 11.2 percent in October of 2009. Over the last twelve months, the rate of unemployment has never fallen below 10.8 percent."

From the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics, here's the raw national unemployment rate since 1980:

And here's EPI's chart comparing the average rate of unemployment for each age group during a year of the current recession and the recession of the early '80s:

Comments

[fortressfountain]

08:59 AM on 07/06/2010

It is not the fault of the boomers who paid social security for the ww2 generation and now for the younger generation and illegals that swell the ss roles.
The boomers also invented the gadgets you young idolize and we at least had decant music. Your music really reaks!

[Plan B Economics]

07:54 AM on 07/06/2010

I agree. We are clearly in another economic depression. Maybe it looks a bit different, but it's a depression nonetheless. And it's going to be years before we're out of it.

It's time to fend for ourselves. The government clearly isn't on the side of the middle class individual: http://www.planbeconomics.com/wealthcreation/

[Bettysdad]

03:44 AM on 07/06/2010

Isn't it time we started referring to stats like this as being "since the LAST depression?"

[flea36]

10:20 PM on 07/05/2010

Bush spent 5 trillion on war and Obama spent 5 trillion in two years! Health care for all and now he'll give amnesty to 10 million mexicans and put them on the rolls so he can get votes, yeah I love the dems.

[flea36]

10:03 PM on 07/05/2010

I am so tired of this. They've had layoffs all through the 2000's and now you can't hope to keep a job even if you perform well. These people on Wall street and in DC deserve to be killed. They've ruined our country.

[JamesTS]

07:30 PM on 07/05/2010

You know who's fault this is: BABY BOOMERS!!!! They ruined it for everyone. They are so stuck in their ways and are never willing to budge just a little. They are all either a left wing Democrat or right wing Republican. They are never moderate and always take their argument to the extreme. Now they're gonna make us pay for their medicare until they die. They are so selfish, they are just fine with their kids and grandchildren going broke and bankrupt. Shame on them!

[graffitijoe]

07:41 AM on 07/06/2010

So, it's the fault of everyone who was born between 1946 and 1964? Throwing out everyone not old enough to vote that's the majority of the country.

[rikster]

06:58 PM on 07/05/2010

!0%..? isn't really closer to 20%...

[pc51]

06:44 PM on 07/05/2010

If you are a small to medium sized employer in this country you are CRAZY to hire new employees and are probably looking for ways to get rid of as many employees as you can. The extreme levels of punishment aganist small-med businesses is just peaking beyond belief. Employee taxes of all kinds and employee insurances cost are skyrocketing and meddling and punishments by all levels of government has reached just intolerable levels as well. You are CRAZY to have a business that requires employees in this country. Go it alone, anyway you can or try to land one of those cushy (if you can get past the nepotism) Fed gigs. Those are really the only 2 options left. Whatever you do - DO NOT make yourself responsible in any way, shape or form for someone else's living. You will suffer mightily at the hands of government, one way or another, if you do. Word to the wise.

[mountainweb]

03:57 PM on 07/05/2010

Obummer has declared "the recession is over", sadly reality says otherwise and delusion by the media continues unabated..

[flashblitzen]

05:54 PM on 07/05/2010

Your mission is therefor "accomplished".

[Bettysdad]

03:44 AM on 07/06/2010

Go ask a parent when Obama said that.

[fortressfountain]

02:26 PM on 07/05/2010

Executives and ceos keep getting hired and yet the money is not flowing into the businesses as the media would have you believe.
I know truckers and business people and they say business is now down 40%.
You do not get any real news on television only silly 4th of July celebrations glorifing celebrities. Television is 2/3s ads so I cancelled my cable. They do not entertain me at all with ads and celebrities.
Just because the media wants to believe the recession is over does not mean the public is foolish and believes this to be trud.

[fortressfountain]

02:22 PM on 07/05/2010

These so called recessions occurr every 15 years or so. This is a way to get rid of the older workers and hire the young at a cheaper rate.
Education level does not matter-as society has never been more educated and yet I do not see the money rolling in.
Don't let the politicans fool you-both parties want to get rid of our social security. Wasting money on the schools is a crock as my generation pays plenty in taxes already.

[Kevin Atlanta]

12:07 PM on 07/05/2010

The Depression is here and it's created by the Holy Republican Cults of Jesus Inc's failed give-aways to the rich and intended to create a civl class war of epic proportions.
Restore the pre-Reagan Tax structure, Glass-Steagall and stop the Corporate Fascist subsidy.
America is in a world of hurt and the crash that's coming is one of nightmare proportions.
Plant your vegetable gardens and learn to can because the Corporate Fascists are hell bent on starving Main Street into complete slavery.

[flea36]

10:06 PM on 07/05/2010

Bill Clinton repealed the Glass Steagall act , look it up.

[Kevin Atlanta]

10:21 PM on 07/05/2010

Bill Clinton with a Republican dominated Congress and Senate with a veto-proof override.
I lived the history. Perhaps you would do well to understand the facts.
The Corporate Fascist and the myth of Corporate Personhood is the enemy now and always. Until the Corporate person is destroyed, the Veil of the Corporate Collective Entity lifted and the Boards of Directors, Executives and Shareholders held liable for their sociopathic acts nothing will change.

[Bettysdad]

03:45 AM on 07/06/2010

Bill Clinton was a Republican in everything except name.

[tim73]

10:51 AM on 07/05/2010

Get ready, folks. USA is about to crash spectacularly, maybe already later this summer. Structural problems are much worse than during 1930's and quantitative easing is simply money printing to cover the problems underneath temporarily. Things are about to get really fugly soon...

[ktkelly]

08:50 AM on 07/05/2010

America has its massive and chronic unemployment now for the simple reason that the depraved took over the economy – all those slicks from the biz and law schools – all swarming to high finance for most selfish short-cuts to their own most-short-term mega profits. Add their cynical brethren years before that exporting good, productive American jobs by the millions. Add Congress, corrupted. Add the Supreme Court – shills for Corporate America. Add those of the fossil fuel behemoths keeping Americans addicted to their non-sustainable and ultimately reckless, extinction-event dependencies.

And – ever in the wings – the dear ol’ military-industrial complex.

[auto325805]

09:43 AM on 07/05/2010

You mean the successful people you are jealous of and the businesses run out of the country by the strong anti-business attitude here and the unions that cost too much.

Oh -and the good ole war - Democrats love a war - and here they continue to spend billions on these two.

[ktkelly]

11:05 AM on 07/05/2010

I love when you GOPigs include Unions in your Elementary school dribble! As far as I'm concerned, anyone who is not a GOPig is SUCCESSFUL!

[seal62]

12:46 PM on 07/05/2010

You lie.

[slogward]

08:30 AM on 07/05/2010

The main unexplained thing about unemployment is what happened to the jobs that just disappeared. Even trying to get to first base on those payroll figures could give you a headache....

http://nbyslog.blogspot.com/2010/07/us-payroll-analysis-it-is-sign-no-it-is.html