pinqy
Gold Member
ParaPundit: College Grad Unemployment Numbers UnderstatedHate to burst your bubble, rdean, but 4 out of 5 recent college grads are unemployed and not counted in the unemployment total, because they are not considered in the labor force until they have a full-time job.
That's untrue. You are in the labor force if you're looking for work (and are available to work), regardless of whether or not you've ever held a job, full time or part time.
See, when you post a link to support your point, it helps if it actually supports your point. That does not. It does not say in there that you are not considered in the labor force until you have a full time job. Here are the definitions:
Labor Force = Employed + Unemployed
Employed =
Unemployed =People are classified as employed if they did any work at all as paid employees during the reference week; worked in their own business, profession, or on their own farm; or worked without pay at least 15 hours in a family business or farm. People are also counted as employed if they were temporarily absent from their jobs because of illness, bad weather, vacation, labor-management disputes, or personal reasons.
Note that neither of those say anything about needing a full time job. And note that there's nothing in the Unemployment definition that requires ever having held any job. In fact, 7.9% of Unemployed never held a job before (22.9% are re-entering the Labor Force after a break).People are classified as unemployed if they meet all of the following criteria: they had no employment during the reference week; they were available for work at that time; and they made specific efforts to find employment sometime during the 4-week period ending with the reference week. Persons laid off from a job and expecting recall need not be looking for work to be counted as unemployed. The unemployment data derived from the household survey in no way depend upon the eligibility for or receipt of unemployment insurance benefits.
Source for definitions is Employment Situation Technical Note
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