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Comment by seoguru | Hacker News Reader

The official unemployment rate (U3 numbers) should be ignored. This number serves little purpose other than being a political tool today.

https://www.facebook.com/ellis.winningham/posts/142209383784...

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To further this, U6 is around 8.6% - 1.

1 - http://www.macrotrends.net/1377/u6-unemployment-rate

U-6 is close to prior Great Recession too, according to the chart.

Once salaries start rising I'll believe you.

U don't have to believe anyone.

But if u believe in math, then even with this U-6 metric, it is back to 2007 level. Meaning this U-6 metric is not really an indicator diverging from the official claim either.

It's positive in that it's tracking with U3. My point is that it unemployment on a daily basis, what mainstream America feels, is still twice as high as the "Full Employment" target set by the Feds.

As to purchasing power, I'm not able to readily find numbers not that. Last I heard, people are working longer hours for the same pay they received in 2007/8. If that's true, they are functionally making less money. I've seen it first hand. People working 45-50 hours to make up for short staffing. However, I only have a few localized, anecdotal data.

I'm looking here:

    http://www.macrotrends.net/1316/us-national-unemployment-rate

I find it almost impossibly odd that "1 year after the decade" is sufficient to imply a recession. By that chart, 2021 is going to blow.

It gives you some idea what the job market is like, on average, based on people who are actually in the market.

From the point of view of employers looking for workers, only the people who apply for open positions actually count. If nobody's applying, there's a shortage. They might have to start paying more. That's meaningful, good news for workers.

On the other hand, if people who weren't looking for work start applying again, it would mean the official unemployment rate goes up. Seems like that could easily happen.

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