RECESSIONS A

ND

UNEMPLOYM

ENT

“It’s a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it’s a depression when you lose your own.”

-President Harry Truman

LABOR FORCE

Does not include:1. People under 16 years

old2. People who cannot work3. People who have

stopped looking for work

Is your retired grandfather unemployed?

No- he is not looking for work

Is a woman who stays home with her kids unemployed?

No- she is not looking for work

An aunt serving in the Armed Forces is posted in Afghanistan. Is she considered unemployed?

No- she is not a member of the civilian labor force because she is serving in the military

A thief serving time in prison lost his job when he was convicted. Is he unemployed?

No- those serving time in prison are not in the adult population and hence not in the labor force

Is a full time college student unemployed?

Not unless he or she is not working and looking for a job.

Unemployment should not hit 0%

Why? Competition

When the economy is strongest- unemployment should be from 3-5%

What is the unemployment rate right now?http://

data.bls.gov/pdq/SurveyOutputServlet

www.bls.gov (Bureau of Labor Statistics) they calculate unemployment rate

Right now the unemployment rate is 5.9%

TYPES OF UNEMPLOYMENT

Structural

Industry becomes obsoleteWorkers with certain skills have nowhere to go

Seasonal

Landscapers, farmers, tourism jobs

Downtimes of the year

Frictional

People entering job market or have decided to leave a job to seek “Greener Pastures”

Largest segment of unemployment figure during periods of strong economy, high employment time

Cyclical

Industry hit hard by downturn in the economy

Auto workers laid off during recessions

http://pewsocialtrends.org/pubs/733/luxury-necessity-recession-era-reevaluations

(Luxury of Necessity- this is a fantastic article that goes through items that people originally reported as being a necessity, but in the recession, changed their opinion to say luxury and not necessary- I highly recommend reading this, and looking at the charts)

online.wsj.com/article/SB124096661843766403.html (you will have to copy and paste this to get to the site- article is about the Yankees lowering their prices for seats during the recession because it didn’t look good to have that many empty seats!)

http://www.goodhousekeeping.com/family/budget/deal-with-recession (This has all sorts of tips on how to save money during a recession, and even some career advice in a bad economy)