Obama's Real Unemployment Rate Is 14.7%, And A Recession's On The Way - Forbes

Obama's Real Unemployment Rate Is 14.7%, And A Recession's On The Way - Forbes

The BLS reported 12.1 million still unemployed in September, another 8.6 million employed part-time for economic reasons, and another 2.5 million marginally attached to the labor force. The latter “were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the [September] survey,” even though they “wanted and were available for work,” according to the BLS.
All of these are counted in the U6 unemployment rate as also reported by the BLS. Because the primary change during the month was that 582,000 on net shifted from unemployed to employed part time for economic reasons, this U6 unemployment rate remained unchanged last month at 14.7%. The total suffering this U6 unemployment was 23.2 million.
Moreover, even this doesn’t nearly fully account for the 8.2 million Americans who have given up hope during the Obama term of office, and dropped out of the work force altogether. When you are considered out of the work force, you are no longer counted as unemployed, even though you still do not have a job, and you still want and are available for work.
The U6 unemployment rate counts only 2.5 million of those 8.2 million who have given up hope and dropped out during the Obama years. The ShadowStats website, which counts the long term discouraged workers the government doesn’t count, reports the total rate for the unemployed and underemployed (part time for economic reasons) as 22.8%.
Of the 12.1 million the government does count as unemployed, a record 40.1% are long term unemployed for more than 6 months. Despite the President’s rhetoric on the campaign trail about manufacturing coming back under his policies, manufacturing jobs declined by another 16,000 last month, making a total decline of 38,000 in the last two months.