It is a thing, people who aren’t actively looking for work (or working) aren’t factored into unemployment numbers. A stay-at-home parent isn’t considered unemployed, or the unemployment numbers would be closer to 40%.
Basically, the unemployment rate means: what share of people are looking for work, but can’t find any?
This also means that there’s a certain number of people who try to find work, aren’t able to find any, and eventually just give up to (stereotypically) move into their parents’ basement or whatever. I take it that AFaithfulNihilist is implying that the number of those people is rising significantly, but there’s not really any evidence for that.
We also have numbers on discouraged workers. BLS publishes all of those numbers, it’s not like they’re a secret. It just tells you a lot less than the mainline number.
It is a thing, people who aren’t actively looking for work (or working) aren’t factored into unemployment numbers. A stay-at-home parent isn’t considered unemployed, or the unemployment numbers would be closer to 40%.
Basically, the unemployment rate means: what share of people are looking for work, but can’t find any?
This also means that there’s a certain number of people who try to find work, aren’t able to find any, and eventually just give up to (stereotypically) move into their parents’ basement or whatever. I take it that AFaithfulNihilist is implying that the number of those people is rising significantly, but there’s not really any evidence for that.
We also have numbers on discouraged workers. BLS publishes all of those numbers, it’s not like they’re a secret. It just tells you a lot less than the mainline number.