Replies

Not wrong, entirely.

According to the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, negative responses to all of the following questions (A) & (B) below, count the person neither as employed or unemployed.

(A) Employed:

(1)Did any work for pay or profit during the survey period, whether full-time, part-time or temporary or
(2)would have met either of those conditions except for, vacation, illness, child-care problems, other family or personal obligations, maternity, labor dispute or inclement weather.

(B) Unemployed:

Does not meet any of the employed conditions and:

(1)Had a job interview,
(2)Contacted an employer, employment agency, friend, relative, of school employment center about a job,
(3)Sent out a resume or job application,
(4)Answered a job advertisement,
(5)Checked a union or professional register, or
(6)some other active job placement acivity.

So if someone answers no to (1) - had not job interview, found no notice of a prospective job (4), after months of weekly checking with (2) did not recheck with them sduring the survey week, and thus found nothing new for (3), and is neither a professional or union member (5) and has tired of emploring friends, relatives and neghbors for help or suggestions (6) and has thus given up, they are not counted as "unemployed".

Now, maybe my use of the term "registered somewhere as actively seeking employment was too limited" (my Alzheimers from knowing the regs), but the spirit is the same - those who, for any number of reasons, are considered by the methods of the Department of Labor as not employed and yet not "actively seeking work" are not counted as unemployed. An unemployed person who has given up is not counted as unemployed.

those who, for any number of reasons, are considered by the methods of the Department of Labor as not employed and yet not "actively seeking work" are not counted as unemployed.

And just how many people can go that long without employment? Where does the money come from to survive? Why wouldn't they be looking for work? Maybe they're working at jobs under the table?

An unemployed person who has given up is not counted as unemployed.

Some people, especially those looking to sell books, believe that there are 5 million people in this country who have become so discouraged that they've quit looking for work altogether. Beyond the obvious ridiculousness of such a statement, one has to wonder just how these unemployed people survive without an income while the number of help wanted ads continues to grow.

Did you know the BLS also measures these folks? NR did a report on the falsehood of the perception that there are lots of discouraged workers out there. This is what they found:

The percentage of unemployed people who have given up looking for work is low, by historical standards, and has recently been dropping. We know this, because the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the same agency that counts the number of unemployed people, also counts the number of discouraged workers — or the number of people who have given up looking for work and say they have done so because they believe there is no appropriate work to be found.
Here's what the BLS found: Only about a third of a percent of American workers are classified in the "discouraged" category. That's right: Ninety-nine and two-thirds percent are not discouraged. This is hardly the teeming mass of employment despondency that we have been led to believe is out there.

The Myth of the Discouraged Worker