US Discouraged Workers Rise to 499,000 as 4.2% Jobless Rate Masks Labor-Market Weakness
Updated
Updated · Newsweek · Jul 7
US Discouraged Workers Rise to 499,000 as 4.2% Jobless Rate Masks Labor-Market Weakness
2 articles · Updated · Newsweek · Jul 7
Summary
499,000 Americans were classified as discouraged workers in June, while 1.83 million were marginally attached to the labor force—the highest such total since November.
Those workers are excluded from the 4.2% unemployment rate because they stopped actively searching, helping explain how joblessness fell even as hundreds of thousands left the workforce.
The labor-force participation rate dropped to a five-year low in June, a shift economists said may reflect weak hiring rather than stronger employment and could later be revised.
Economists describe the market as “no hire, low fire”: layoffs remain subdued, but limited openings, slower growth, high rates and trade-policy uncertainty are making job searches longer and pushing some workers to give up.