De-facto Unemployment Rate

Definitions:

Officially Unemployed- Persons who worked less than one hour during the nationally determined reference period (one week), looked for during this period, and were available for work during this period.

Latent Job Candidates

•  Marginally attached workers - Persons not in the labor force who want and are available for work and who have looked for a job sometime in prior 12 months (or since the end of their last job if they held one within the past 12 months), but were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the four weeks preceding the survey.
• Discouraged workers - Persons not is labor force who want are available for a job and who have looked for work sometime in the past 12 months (or since the end of their last job if they held one within the past 12 months)

Underemployed -Persons who would like to work full-time but are not able to do so for economic reasons such as unavailability of full-time work or reduced demand for hours by current employer

Excess disability - Persons who are excluded from labor force because of sick leave or early retirement

Government Programs - Persons receiving government subsidized or government provided programs. For example, low wage workers receiving Earned Income Tax Credits

Prison and Jail Populations - Persons not in labor force because of incarceration.

These estimates may be low given what has happened in the economy and the lack of current data. For example, individuals going to colleges and universities have increased dramatically during the current recession/regional depression but are not counted as part of labor market.

For more information about the de-facto unemployment rate, contact John Russo at the Center of Working-Class Studies at jbrusso@ysu.edu.