Someone once said the truth will make you free. At least it can make you smarter. In such context I add to my LONG theme that the low unemployment rate touted not just by the current Administration but the last several, GOP and Democrats, has been often used to cite achievement on the labor front. Well, it has gone down in recoveries and up in recessions but what does it really tell us? I continue to think the low wage gains are the flip side of that coin telling us the low unemployment rate isn’t the whole story.
Cue the folks at the Liscio report that either borrowed the next set of charts from me or me from them. It makes no difference. They are great and smart people and I consider Philippa Dunne a fellow traveler and friend for these last few decades.
Cutting to the chase, she just published the following charts which show the ration of INSURED workers to the civilian unemployment rate and Continuing Unemployment Claims (only those insured qualify) as a percent of job losers. Note the downward trend, the sharp downward trend.
What this tells you is that the low unemployment figures overstate the strength of the job market because there’s been such a rise in ‘gig’ workers who don’t qualify for unemployment insurance or a spot in many of the official records. Back in the 1970s, insured workers made up over 60% of the unemployed. Today that’s in the 30s; 70-ish percent of the job losers don’t get benefits, which means that the real unemployment figures could be twice what the official stats reveal. That’s probably an exaggeration, but the point is it’s higher than what we had before all this mess.
We’re hunkering down; stocks, armed and climbing the walls. Yes, we have a climbing wall!
