Joblessness+in+America

For nearly three years, Americans have been facing a serious economic challenge. In late 2007 and early 2008, the country's unemployment rate began to rise sharply. As of July 2011, 13.9 million Americans were unemployed. Chances are good that most of your students know someone who is out of work. But just how bad is the unemployment crisis? And what does it mean to be an unemployed person in America today?  **Student Reading 1:**

**How Bad Is America's Unemployment Crisis?**

Few things are more important in most peoples' lives than their jobs. We use jobs to measure everything from individual success to the overall health of our economy. The very high level of joblessness over the last several years is a clear indication that the country's economy is in crisis. The most widely cited statistic used to discuss joblessness is the unemployment rate. This measure takes the total number of unemployed people in the country and divides it by the total labor force. Over the past few decades, the unemployment rate in the United States has tended to fluctuate between 4 and 6 percent. The current unemployment rate is stuck at approximately 9 percent. The economic meltdown, which witnessed the collapse of a number of major financial institutions in 2008, caused a ripple effect that shook nearly all sectors of the economy. In late 2007, the unemployment rate, which had for the previous two years remained steady at around 4.5 percent, began to rise dramatically. By the end of 2008 the unemployment rate had reached 7.3 percent. It peaked in late 2009, reaching 10.1 percent in October of that year. Since then it has dropped slightly, but it remained around 9 percent through the first half of 2011. The line graph below shows what this means in terms of the total number of people who are out of work:



At the highest point of unemployment, 15.6 million people were without work in America. Currently, 13.9 million who want work cannot find jobs. For young people, finding a job is especially hard. People aged 16 to 24 (which of course includes many high school and college students and recent graduates) have a higher unemployment rate than the general population. Between the beginning of 2008 and July 2011, the unemployment rate within this age bracket rose from 14 percent to 18.1 percent. When general unemployment is high, businesses tend to hire older and more experienced workers for positions that had previously been considered "entry-level" - making it extra hard for younger people to be hired. Another telling statistic is the "average duration of unemployment." For much of the past 50 years, this number has fluctuated between 10 and 20 weeks. In the current economy it is taking people much longer, on average, for people to find work.The average length of time that people remain unemployed has skyrocketed since early 2008 to over 40 weeks - 10 months, on average - far above the norm since 1948:

While statistics about joblessness provide insight into the state of the economy as a whole, they give little sense of the personal toll that unemployment takes on individuals. In many cases, the experience of being unemployed comes with great personal anguish. To open a window into this emotional dimension of unemployment, the //Washington Post// has featured the stories of several job seekers. Among them is Stephanie Dudgeon, 48, from Columbus, Ohio, who has shared her experience being unemployed in a series of blog posts. In a post from July 2011, she describes the anxiety she's been feeling: "Sometime in the spring, I began to notice job openings beginning to dwindle. I remember the gloomy spring day when I had a panic attack and a flood of horrifying scenarios began running through my mind. Said fears ranged from becoming homeless, to being unable to obtain basic medical care, to being unemployed forever. That was when persistent dread and amplified anxiety entered my daily existence."

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">( <span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> [] )

<span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Dudgeon's fears are shared by many contributors to the //Washington Post// series, and no doubt by countless others who have struggled with unemployment during this economic downturn. The experience of being unemployed for nearly a full year leads many people to blame themselves for not finding a job. As Dudgeon goes on to note: <span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">"One of the more painful parts of being unemployed has been a growing feeling of failure. This weekend, my graduating high school class will be having a reunion. But I won't be there because I dreaded the prospect of being repeatedly asked, 'What do you do now?'" <span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> **1.** What does unemployment rate measure? How is it calculated? How does unemployment in the past three years compare with historical trends? <span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">**2.** What are some other ways to talk about issues of joblessness in this country? Do you think that the length of time that people spend looking for work is a relevant measure of the crisis? How does this measure provide different insights into the unemployment situation? <span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">**3.** Do you know people who have been unemployed? If so, what has their experience been? Have you or your friends struggled to find jobs? <span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">**4.** Do you think Stephanie Dudgeon's experiences are common? What are the advantages or disadvantages of personal stories as a way of understanding the issue, as compared to using statistics? <span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> <span style="font-family: Verdana,Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">