a third of the metro areas have an unemployment rate of 5% or less.
Meaning two thirds do not, and the third that does has such unemployment numbers in the context of a big drop in labor participation. If more and more people aren't considered in the workforce, and so don't count as unemployed, then with any semi-decent growth at all its easy to get reduced unemployment rates.
This labor participation rate is mostly Republican poppycock. The boomers are retiring. They are not looking for jobs. ND has been at 2-3% unemployment for years.........they are begging people to move there. Seattle's unemployment rate stayed in the 5.5% range for 4-6 months last year despite good job growth. Maybe at that point more people re entered the local labor market but that period was merely a blip and now Seattle's unemployment rate is down to 4.3%.
Currently, 2/3 of all metros are at 6% or less unemployment rate.........the labor participation rate be damned.
Of course the participation rate is lower.......the boomers are retiring.
Which is not nearly enough to account for the lower participation rate, and that's even if you don't adjust for the fact that the retirement rate at any given age has gone down. The labor force participation rate for older Americans has been increasing, while the participation rate for younger Americans has gone down.
"Since 2003, those 65 years and older have seen their labor force participation rate rise from 13.99 percent to 18.7 percent. Those aged 55-64 saw their rate rise from 62.44 percent to 64.36 percent, a recent Americans for Limited Government (ALG) study of Bureau data from 2003-2013 shows. Meanwhile, participation by those aged 16-24 dropped from 61.56 percent in 2003 to 55.05 percent in 2013, and for those aged 25-54, it dropped from 82.98 percent to 82.01 percent...
forbes.com
This is such nonsense..........another apolitical view from the IMF:
Recent U.S. Labor Force Dynamics: Reversible or not?
Abstract
The U.S. labor force participation rate (LFPR) fell dramatically following the Great Recession and has yet to start recovering.A key question is how much of the post 2007 decline is reversible , something which is central to the policy debate.The key finding of this paper is that while around 1/4–1/3 of the post -2007 decline is reversible, the LFPR will continue to decline given population aging. This paper’s measure of the “employment gap" also suggests that labor market slack remains and will only decline gradually, pointing to a still important role for stimulative macro-economic policies to help reach full employment. In addition, given the continued downward pressure on the LFPR, labor supply measures will be an essential component of the strategy to boost potential growth. Finally, stimulative macroeconomic and labor supply policies should also help reduce the scope for further hysteresis effects to develop(e.g., loss of skills, discouragement)
imf.org |
