February 2012 Unemployment

February 2012

Unemployment Rate: 8.3 percent

Unemployed Americans: 12.8 million

Employment

1. The Department of Labor reported an unemployment rate of 8.3 percent for February 2012, unchanged from January, and an increase of 227,000 nonfarm jobs.
2. Most of the new jobs were professional and business services, leisure and hospitality, manufacturing, mining, and health care positions.
3. This makes 37 straight months under President Obama with unemployment over 8 percent.
4. The economy lost 864,000 net jobs since February 2009 when the Democrats’ “stimulus” was signed into law. President Obama promised 6 percent unemployment by this time.

“Real” Unemployment

1. The “real” unemployment or U-6 rate is 14.9 percent for February 2012, down 0.2 percent from January. This is the total percentage of unemployed workers, plus the marginally attached workers and part time workers for economic reasons.
2. The “real” number of unemployed Americans is 23.5 million. These are people that are unemployed (12.8 million), want work but have stopped searching for a job (2.6 million), or are working part-time because they can’t find full-time employment (8.1 million).
3. 1 million Americans are so discouraged by the prospects of finding a job that they stopped looking for work, which is an decrease of 53,000 people. These workers are a subset of those that are marginally attached to the workforce.
4. The labor force participation rate is 63.9 percent. At the Congressional Budget Office projected labor participation rate of 65.3 percent for 2012, the unemployment rate would be 10.3 percent.

Weeks, Hours & Wages

1. The number of Americans searching for work for more than 27 weeks is 5.4 million and the average number of weeks a worker is unemployed is 40 weeks. Both are double from when the President took office.
2. The average workweek for private nonfarm employees remained the same at 34.5 hours.
3. The average hourly private nonfarm payroll increased by 3 cents to $23.31.