"Real" Unemployment Rate (U-6) Surges to 16.8%

After ticking lower in July, the U-6, which some call the real unemployment number, rose to 16.8% in August. It was 16.3% in July and 16.5% in June.

The U-6 is Total unemployed, plus all marginally attached workers, plus total employed part time for economic reasons, as a percent of the civilian labor force plus all marginally attached workers. Marginally attached workers are persons who currently are neither working nor looking for work but indicate that they want and are available for a job and have looked for work sometime in the recent past. Discouraged workers, a subset of the marginally attached, have given a job-market related reason for not looking currently for a job. Persons employed part time for economic reasons are those who want and are available for full-time work but have had to settle for a part-time schedule.

You May Also Be Interested In

• 30-year mortgage rate dips to 6.65%, second weekly decline
• Startup Micro1 offering $12.5M for Spirit Airlines data - Business Insider
• S&P 500 may pull back before midterms, but Citi says buy the dip