On Apr 8, 2009, at 10:19 PM, Marv Gandall wrote:
> The government's broader "U-6" number, which includes discouraged
> workers
> and part-timers who can't find full-time jobs, was closer to a
> (staggering)
> 16% last month.
>
> How did they measure unemployment in the early 30's, before the New
> Deal
> introduced UI, whose claims are the basis for determining the
> official rate
> most commonly used today?
The numbers I quoted come from an approximation of the BLS series by Geoffrey Moore. So the numbers I cited would be comparable to today's headline rate, not the U-6.
For a long-term chart, see:
<http://tlrii.typepad.com/theliscioreport/2009/01/calculating-the-unemployment-rate.html
>.
Doug