Unemployment number don't always include part-timers or freelancers. Graphic designer Alex Profera (pictured above) has been looking for full-time employment, but is not counted as underemployed because of his freelance hours. Photo by Andrew Parsons.
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Last month’s unemployment number may have helped renew optimism in the economy, but that number is only a portion of the total Americans who are currently jobless or without full-time work. Many economists even believe that this number doesn’t completely reflect the labor market anymore.
BY ANDREW PARSONS
Last month’s unemployment number may have helped renew optimism in the economy, but that number is only a portion of the total Americans who are currently jobless or without full-time work. Many economists even believe that this number doesn’t completely reflect the labor market anymore.
Every month when the federal government releases its jobs report, politicians and pundits focus on one magical number – the unemployment rate. But many economists don’t think it completely reflects labor market anymore. Bernard Baumohl, an economist at the consulting firm the Economic Outlook Group, said he’s tired of hearing about it.
“It’s almost a useless indicator these days because just a lot of people are leaving the workforce and setting up their own jobs,” said Baumohl. “I think we have to be careful in using the unemployment rate as a gauge of what’s going on in the job market.”
The problem is that the unemployment number isn’t a accurate representation of how many Americans are really looking for full-time work. For the past decade, companies have been relying more on temporary employees and freelancers who also are looking for jobs. Freelance fashion designer Carolyn Ksenyak is one of them. She lost her full-time job about a year but now pieces income together by freelancing.
“I some times work 4 days a week and sometimes I would work 1 day a week so it is really not consistent,” Ksenyak said. “Like this week has been nothing which has been awful.”
On weeks where she freelances, she collects only a portion of her unemployment benefits. But the fact that she works at all means, she isn’t always counted as unemployed. Heidi Sherholtz, a labor economist at the Economic Policy Institute, said that whether she’s unemployed or part-time actually depends on the week.
“She’d be different from week to week,” said Sherholtz. “So in the weeks where she was looking for work but didn’t have any paid earnings she’d be counted as officially unemployed. In the weeks where she got paid for some work but didn’t get up to 35 hours, she would be classified as involuntary part time.”
On the other hand, is graphic designer Alex Profera. According to labor statistics he counts as full-time, self-employed. Like Ksenyak, he was laid off about a year ago and has been freelancing ever since. The difference is that all of his projects add up to more than 40 hours a week.
Even so, he’s still looking for a full-time job. “I’m usually always looking for work, usually nonstop basically since 2010 after I got fired after that other job,” Profera said.
The monthly unemployment numbers don’t necessarily capture what Profera and fashion designer Carolyn Ksenyak are going through. Sylvia Allegretto, a labor economist at University of California at Berkeley, saidthat the only place to see the whole picture is the Bureau of Labor Statistics. That means going to the website and clicking through to all the numbers including the unemployment rate, the underemployment rate and the size of the labor market among others.
“And if you do this by age, cohorts and gender and stuff, then it really gives you a picture of what’s going on,” said Allegretto. “And what’s going on is that the labor market is still very tepid for workers.”
Tepid, but according to all indications slowly improving. The next jobs report will be released on the first Friday of March.
