Granted, I work with demographic numbers like this for my job, but here are a few observations I can make from it:
Employment (and unemployment) are strongly correlated with education level.
For people with less than a high school education, the unemployment rate (5.7%) is three times as high as for people with a college degree (1.9%).
For people who only have a high school diploma, their unemployment rate (3.6%) is nearly twice as high as for those with a college degree.
Also, the unemployment rate is only calculated among those people who are actually “in the civilian labor force” (i.e., currently working, or looking for work). For those with a college degree, the “participation rate” is 73%; for those with only a high school diploma, it’s 58%, and for those who did not graduate from high school, it’s only 48%. This suggests that a lot of those people have, essentially, given up on trying to find work (though, certainly, a percentage of them are stay-at-home parents, retirees, etc.).
It’s entirely meaningless to quote a snapshot that includes categories of people who don’t want to be in the work force (retirees, work for family at home by choice etc), just referring to them non-quantitatively, then also just seem to rely on the numbers looking ‘low’ to make the point.
The relevant stats are easy to get. See link for a graph on participation rate of prime working age people, it’s definitely increased in the last few years. Likewise the broader measure of unemployment, U6, has trended down in parallel with the ‘headline’ U3 rate (second link), and like the U3 it’s now similar to level in late Clinton years where there isn’t much debate it was a ‘good employment situation’. Although for ‘historic low’ comparisons U6 hasn’t been calculated for as long as U3 has.
Which if any politician should be ‘credited’ with this is a political opinion discussion with no factual answer. However the idea ‘no, the employment situation isn’t really OK, see this individual person, or look at this number in a vacuum, isn’t it pretty high/low?’ that’s stretching it IMHO. The employment situation in US now by the relevant measures is pretty good and better than a few years ago. Running against the person in office while that happened you’re probably better off emphasizing the other things you could do better or he’s done wrong than trying to argue that the basic employment situation isn’t pretty good.
Also, some of them that wouldn’t be considered in the civilian work force are part of the underground economy. That doesn’t necessarily mean drug dealing, prostitution or other criminal activity. They could also be the landscaper or help out at their buddy’s restaurant.
The point is that “everyone you know” is not a representative slice of the US population and is impossible to base an informed post on. Very possible to base uninformed posts on.
This doesn’t tell me anything I haven’t know for as long as I could conceptualize the concept of a “job”. That there is a strong correlation between education, employment and compensation.
It’s not like jobs for college or high school dropouts were that great 30 years ago either. Those were jobs I worked to make extra money while I was in high school and college - fast food, restaurants, retail, factory and light industrial, low-level office clerical, warehouse work, manual labor. They paid minimum wage or close to it. They were dirty and unpleasant. Much of it has been permanently outsourced or automated.
You don’t have enough data to determine who I know and how closely they correlate to a cross section of the greater population of the US.
I think this is a huge failing of modern companies. There seems to be little tolerance for doing what in former times, would be called a ‘workmanlike’ job- maybe not awesome, maybe not spectacular, or gorgeous or whatever, but solid, good and well done.
Nope, they’re looking for that one-in-a-million employee who will work 70 hour weeks, volunteer on the weekends wearing a company shirt, AND do a spectacularly good job at it all, as well as innovate new ways of doing the company’s business.
There are people like that, I’m sure. But they’re exceedingly rare. Most people are able to do that workmanlike job at their career, and that should be rewarded, not treated like it’s just the bare minimum. It sends the wrong message and is a powerfully demotivating thing to people who aren’t rock stars. They feel that if doing a good job isn’t enough, so why bother? And they disengage from their jobs emotionally and coast.
I have to think this costs the companies far more money than if they just rewarded good work appropriately, rather than listening to a bunch of dumb-ass MBAs who read too much Jack Welch and think his BS actually applies to the rank and file people.
