MAY 1999 UNEMPLOYMENT DATA*
(U.S. BUREAU OF LABOR STATISTICS )
White | 3.7% |
Black | 7.5% |
Hispanic | 6.7% |
Men 20 years and over | 3.6 % |
Women 20 years and over | 3.6% |
Teen-agers (16-19 years) | 12.6% |
Black teens | 24.1% |
Officially unemployed | 5.8 million workers |
HIDDEN UNEMPLOYMENT |
|
Working part-time because can't find a full-time job: | 3.4 million |
People who want jobs but
are not counted in official statistics because not looking (of which 1.1 million searched for work during the prior 12 months and were available for work during the reference week.) |
5.3 million |
Total 14.5 million (10.0% of the labor force)
In addition, millions more were working full-time, year-round, yet earned less than the official poverty level for a family of four. In the latest year for which data are available, 1997, that number was 16.8 million, 18 percent of full-time workers (estimated from Money Income in the United States, Bureau of the Census, Sept. 1998, Table 10). Roughly one in four women and one in seven men who had full-time jobs the year round earned less than the poverty level for a family of four.
*See Uncommon Sense #4 for an explanation of the unemployment measures.
National Jobs for All Coalition