Recovery-less Recovery: Unemployment Duration July 2013

Today's employment situation report showed that conditions for the long term unemployed improved in July while still remaining distressed by historic standards.

Workers unemployed 27 weeks or more declined to 4.246 million or 37.0% of all unemployed workers while the median term of unemployment declined to 15.7 weeks and the average stay on unemployment increased to 36.6 weeks.

Looking at the charts below (click for super interactive versions) you can see that today’s sorry situation far exceeds even the conditions seen during the double-dip recessionary period of the early 1980s, long considered by economists to be the worst period of unemployment since the Great Depression.

Recovery-less Recovery: Unemployment Duration June 2013

Last week's employment situation report showed that conditions for the long term unemployed improved in June while still remaining distressed by historic standards.

Workers unemployed 27 weeks or more declined to 4.328 million or 36.7% of all unemployed workers while the median term of unemployment declined to 16.3 weeks and the average stay on unemployment declined to 35.6 weeks.

Looking at the charts below (click for super interactive versions) you can see that today’s sorry situation far exceeds even the conditions seen during the double-dip recessionary period of the early 1980s, long considered by economists to be the worst period of unemployment since the Great Depression.

Recovery-less Recovery: Unemployment Duration May 2013

Today's employment situation report showed that conditions for the long term unemployed were mixed in May while still remaining distressed by historic standards.

Workers unemployed 27 weeks or more increased to 4.357 million or 37.3% of all unemployed workers while the median term of unemployment declined to 17.3 weeks and the average stay on unemployment increased to 36.9 weeks.

Looking at the charts below (click for super interactive versions) you can see that today’s sorry situation far exceeds even the conditions seen during the double-dip recessionary period of the early 1980s, long considered by economists to be the worst period of unemployment since the Great Depression.

Recovery-less Recovery: Unemployment Duration April 2013

Today's employment situation report showed that conditions for the long term unemployed improved in April  while still remaining distressed by historic standards.

Workers unemployed 27 weeks or more declined to 4.353 million or 37.4% of all unemployed workers while the median term of unemployment declined to 17.5 weeks and the average stay on unemployment declined to 36.5 weeks.

Looking at the charts below (click for super interactive versions) you can see that today’s sorry situation far exceeds even the conditions seen during the double-dip recessionary period of the early 1980s, long considered by economists to be the worst period of unemployment since the Great Depression.

Extended Unemployment: Initial, Continued and Extended Unemployment Claims April 11 2013

Today’s jobless claims report showed declines to both initial and continued unemployment claims as initial claims trended well below the closely watched 400K level.

Seasonally adjusted “initial” unemployment claims declined by a notable 42,000 to 346,000 claims from 388,000 claims for the prior week while seasonally adjusted “continued” claims declined by 12,000 claims to 3.079 million resulting in an “insured” unemployment rate of 2.4%.

Since the middle of 2008 though, two federal government sponsored “extended” unemployment benefit programs (the “extended benefits” and “EUC 2008” from recent legislation) have been picking up claimants that have fallen off of the traditional unemployment benefits rolls.

Currently there are some 1.83 million people receiving federal “extended” unemployment benefits.

Taken together with the latest 3.35 million people that are currently counted as receiving traditional continued unemployment benefits, there are 5.18 million people on state and federal unemployment rolls.

Recovery-less Recovery: Unemployment Duration March 2013

Today's employment situation report showed that conditions for the long term unemployed were mixed in March while still remaining distressed by historic standards.

Workers unemployed 27 weeks or more declined to 4.611 million or 39.6% of all unemployed workers while the median term of unemployment increased to 18.1 weeks and the average stay on unemployment increased to 37.1 weeks.

Looking at the charts below (click for super interactive versions) you can see that today’s sorry situation far exceeds even the conditions seen during the double-dip recessionary period of the early 1980s, long considered by economists to be the worst period of unemployment since the Great Depression.

On The Stamp: Food Stamp Participation November 2012

As a logical consequence of the prolonged economic downturn, participation in the federal food stamp program is continuing to rise.

In fact, household participation has been climbing so steadily that it has dwarfed the last peak (which looks like a minor blip by comparison) set as a result of the immediate fallout following hurricane Katrina.

The latest data released by the Department of Agriculture indicated that in November, 141,067 recipients were added to the food stamps program with the current total increasing 3.04% on a year-over-year basis.

Individuals receiving food stamp benefits increased to 47.69 million which, as a ratio of the overall civilian non-institutional population, increased 1.46% on the month to now stand at a whopping 19.53% of the population.

Households receiving food stamps benefits increased by 73,952 to 23.01 million with the current total rising 4.50% above the level seen a year earlier

As participation continues to swell, so too has the total nominal benefit cost climbing 4.26% on a year-over-year basis to $6.47 billion for the month.

On The Stamp: Food Stamp Participation October 2012

Recovery-less Recovery: Unemployment Duration January 2013

Today's employment situation report showed that conditions for the long term unemployed improved notably in January while still remaining distressed by historic standards.

Workers unemployed 27 weeks or more decreased to 4.708 million or 38.1% of all unemployed workers (the lowest level seen since November 2009) while the median term of unemployment dropped to 16.0 weeks and the average stay on unemployment declined to 35.3 weeks.

Looking at the charts below (click for super interactive versions) you can see that today’s sorry situation far exceeds even the conditions seen during the double-dip recessionary period of the early 1980s, long considered by economists to be the worst period of unemployment since the Great Depression.

On The Margin: Total Unemployment January 2013

Today’s Employment Situation report showed that in January “total unemployment” including all marginally attached workers went flat at 14.4% while the traditionally reported unemployment rate also ticked up slightly to 7.9%.

The traditional unemployment rate is calculated from the monthly household survey results using a fairly explicit definition of “unemployed” (essentially unemployed and currently looking for full time employment) leaving many workers to be considered effectively “on the margin” either employed in part time work when full time is preferred or simply unemployed and no longer looking for work.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics considers “marginally attached” workers (including discouraged workers) and persons who have settled for part time employment to be “underutilized” labor.

The broadest view of unemployment would include both traditionally unemployed workers and all other underutilized workers.

To calculate the “total” rate of unemployment we would simply use this larger group rather than the smaller and more restrictive “unemployed” group used in the traditional unemployment rate calculation.

Recovery-less Recovery: Unemployment Duration November 2012

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Today's employment situation report showed that conditions for the long term unemployed improved in November remaining epically distressed by historic standards.

Workers unemployed 27 weeks or more decreased to 4.786 million or 40.1% of all unemployed workers while the median number of weeks unemployed dropped to 19.0 weeks and the average stay on unemployment declined to 40.0 weeks.

Looking at the charts below (click for super interactive versions) you can see that today’s sorry situation far exceeds even the conditions seen during the double-dip recessionary period of the early 1980s, long considered by economists to be the worst period of unemployment since the Great Depression.

Recovery-less Recovery: Unemployment Duration September 2012

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Today's employment situation report showed that conditions for the long term unemployed went mixed in September remaining epically distressed by historic standards.

Workers unemployed 27 weeks or more declined to 4.844 million or 40.1% of all unemployed workers while the median number of weeks unemployed climbed to 18.5 weeks and the average stay on unemployment rose to 39.8 weeks.

Looking at the charts below (click for super interactive versions) you can see that today’s sorry situation far exceeds even the conditions seen during the double-dip recessionary period of the early 1980s, long considered by economists to be the worst period of unemployment since the Great Depression.

On The Margin: Total Unemployment August 2012

Today’s Employment Situation report showed that in August “total unemployment” including all marginally attached workers declined to 14.7% while the traditionally reported unemployment rate declined to 8.1%.

The traditional unemployment rate is calculated from the monthly household survey results using a fairly explicit definition of “unemployed” (essentially unemployed and currently looking for full time employment) leaving many workers to be considered effectively “on the margin” either employed in part time work when full time is preferred or simply unemployed and no longer looking for work.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics considers “marginally attached” workers (including discouraged workers) and persons who have settled for part time employment to be “underutilized” labor.

The broadest view of unemployment would include both traditionally unemployed workers and all other underutilized workers.

To calculate the “total” rate of unemployment we would simply use this larger group rather than the smaller and more restrictive “unemployed” group used in the traditional unemployment rate calculation.

Recovery-less Recovery: Unemployment Duration April 2012

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Today's employment situation report showed that conditions for the long term unemployed improved in April but remained epically distressed by historic standards.

Workers unemployed 27 weeks or more declined to 5.101 million or 41.3% of all unemployed workers while the median number of weeks unemployed declined to 19.4 weeks and the average stay on unemployment declined to 39.1 weeks, the highest level ever recorded.

Looking at the charts below (click for super interactive versions) you can see that today’s sorry situation far exceeds even the conditions seen during the double-dip recessionary period of the early 1980s, long considered by economists to be the worst period of unemployment since the Great Depression.