The Complicated Dynamics of American Unemployment

According to MarketWatch,

Employers say they’re having difficulty filling jobs. Jobless Americans say they want to work. So what’s going on?

But a recent poll of 1,000 unemployed workers by CNBC and Morning Consult told a different story. Respondents said the trickle-down effect of job openings had not reached them — at least, not yet. Some 87% said they had not received job offers in the last six months.

Here's what’s going on

First of all, we have to come to an agreement on what constitutes the unemployed. I've written on this before. The government inaccurately shows the current rate at 5.8%, which is wildly wrong-headed and they’ve been at this wildly wrong-headedness for decades. The actual percentage is far more likely to be in the range of 40% and that’s a hell-of-a-lot of Americans, my friend.

How did they miss the mark by 700%?

In general, the unemployment rate in the United States is obtained by dividing the number of unemployed persons by the number of persons in the labor forc…