Distortions of US Jobs Data

Missing Workers: The Missing Part of the Unemployment Story

Updated July 3, 2014.

In a complex economy, conventional measures sometimes fall short.

In today’s labor market, the unemployment rate drastically understates the weakness of job opportunities. This is due to the existence of a large pool of “missing workers”—potential workers who, because of weak job opportunities, are neither employed nor actively seeking a job. In other words, these are people who wouldbe either working or looking for work if job opportunities were significantly stronger. Because jobless workers are only counted as unemployed if they are actively seeking work, these “missing workers” are not reflected in the unemployment rate.

As part of its ongoing effort to create the metrics needed to assess how well the economy is working for America’s broad middle class, EPI is introducing its “missing worker” estimates,which will be updated on this page on the first Friday of every month immediately after the Bureau of Labor Statistics releases its jobs numbers. The “missing worker” estimates provide policymakers with a key gauge of the health of the labor market.




Current “missing worker” estimates at a glance

Updated July 3, 2014, based on most current data available

• Total missing workers, June 2014: 5,980,000
• Unemployment rate if missing workers were looking for work: 9.6%
• Official unemployment rate: 6.1%
• http://www.epi.org/publication/missing-workers/