Below is the BLS summary. Notice that -any- paid work during the reference week counts the individual as employed. And anyone not actively looking for work (actually contacting an employer or job center) in the previous 4 weeks is counted as not in the labour force even if they were attending job training or retraining or simply discouraged for a while.
In any case the figures Doug presented illustrate quite well that to speak of European rate of unemplyment is meaningless along with any general claim about the cause of unemployment in Europe which is the basis of BDL's argument. It is well known that even when real wages are falling it is possible that employment can also be falling. The simple NC story is just wrong. Period.
tfast
BLS: To summarize: Employed persons consist of:
a.. All persons who did any work for pay or profit during the survey week.
a.. All persons who did at least 15 hours of unpaid work in a family-operated enterprise.
a.. All persons who were temporarily absent from their regular jobs because of illness, vacation, bad weather, industrial dispute, or various personal reasons, whether or not they were paid for the time off.
Unemployed persons are:
a.. All persons who did not have a job at all during the survey week, made specific active efforts to find a job during the prior 4 weeks, and were available for work (unless temporarily ill).
a.. All persons who were not working and were waiting to be called back to a job from which they had been laid off need not be looking for work to be classified as unemployed.
http://www.bls.gov/cps/cps_htgm.htm
----- Original Message ----- From: "Jim Devine" <jdevine03 at gmail.com> To: <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org> Sent: Monday, April 03, 2006 6:01 PM Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] Brad DeLong's dubious view of layoff restrictions
> >On 4/3/06, jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net <jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net> wrote: I
> was always under the impression that US unemployment counted the rolls
> of those receiving unemployment checks .... When you stop receiving
> your check you were no longer counted even if you still have not found
> work. This is not true? The US counts as unemployed people who have
> used up their unemployment insurance yet have not found work?<
>
> the US Bureau of Labor Statistics uses a sample survey of those
> outside of "institutions" (prisons, etc.) If you don't have a job but
> you're actively looking for one, you're counted as unemployed. Period.
> --
> Jim Devine / "There can be no real individual freedom in the presence
> of economic insecurity." -- Chester Bowles
>
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