US unemployment reaches record highs in August

National unemployment figures reached record highs in August according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.   The unemployment rate jumped from 9.4 percent in July to 9.7 percent last month.   The underemployment rate reached 16.8 percent. This includes people who have given up looking for a job and those who are working part-time but would like to have a full-time job.

Dr Lauren Applebaum is from UCLA´s  institute for research on labor and employment. She says men are being hard hit by the recession.

“The unemployment rate for adult men is now 10.1 percent, so it's crossed the ten percent mark. A lot of those people who are involuntarily working part time are women whose husbands have lost their job and they are looking for work, but they´re able to find only part time work. And also the significance of the higher male unemployment in this recession is that women earn less than men do. A lot of families are trying to get by on much less, on that one female salary.”

Despite these problems, the rate of jobs lost is slowing down.  In August, 216,000 jobs were lost, compared to 276,000 in July. Applebaum says that despite these advances the recession is far from over.

“There has been a slowdown in the job loss over the last few months because the stimulus package is doing something to jumpstart the economy. But 6.9 million jobs have been lost since December 2007 and there are shorter hours and lower salaries and fewer benefits now. While the stimulus package and while the economy  has been jumpstarted, its not enough. The engine is not able to keep running on its own.”

The manufacturing and construction sectors continue to lose the greatest number of jobs. While employment in the healthcare and education sectors has stabilized.