Nonfarm payroll employment continued to decline in April (-539,000), and the unemployment rate rose from 8.5 to 8.9 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. Since the recession began in December 2007, 5.7 million jobs have been lost. In April, job losses were large and widespread across nearly all major private-sector industries. Overall, private-sector employment fell by 611,000.
Let's break these down.
Unemployment increased .4 percent. Over the past 12 months, that number has increased 3.9%.
The best read of job creation from the last expansion is total growth of 8.2 million. Now we've lost almost 70% of those jobs that have been created. That's a record.
All undustries -- save education and health care -- lost jobs
So -- the numbers overall were terrible. Let's look at some charts.
The unemployment rate is now the highest it been since the early 1980s recession
People unemployed for 5-14 weeks is now at the absolute highest level in in the last 30 years
The number unemployed for 15 weeks is now at the absolute highest level in over 30 years
The number unemployed for 27+ weeks is now at the absolute highest level in 30 years
The median weeks of unemployment is now the nearly the highest its been in 30 years
U6 which is "Total unemployed, plus all marginally attached workers plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of all civilian labor force plus all marginally attached workers" is now atthe highest level since 1994.
