Long-Term Unemployment Rate 9.4% Hits Record

by Floyd Norris
June 5, 2009

The unemployment rate rose to 9.4 percent in May, the government says. That is bad enough, but we’ve seen worse.

What is more alarming is the long-term unemployment rate. The government says that 4.5 percent of the work force has been out of work for 15 weeks or more. The worst previously seen — at least since 1948, when the government began counting people that way — was 4.2 percent, in December 1982.

Put another way, 21 percent of those who are unemployed have been out of work for at least 15 weeks. That is also a record, exceeding the 19.6 percent proportion seen during the 1958 recession. the rest