Posted - Filed under Data News, Household Survey.

For more charts and tables at finer levels of detail, please visit our Unemployment Dataset Page.

U3 unemployment rate

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The BLS U.3 unemployment rate fell in July to 4.3% from 4.4% in June. The Labor Force Participation rate rose to 62.9% from 62.8%. The Employment/Population Ratio rose to 60.2% from 60.1%. The contribution of these two factors to the Unemployment Rate is shown in the chart below.

U3 Contributions

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The relationship between the three measures is as follows:

UR = (LR – ER) / LR

Where LR is the Labor Force Participation Rate, and ER is the Employment Ratio. Note how a decrease in the participation rate on its own, reduces the unemployment rate: The number of available workers drops, and thus there are relatively fewer unemployed – even in the absence of job growth. This is what has happened in the recovery since the “Great Recession”.

Labor Force Participation Rate

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Employment Population Ratio

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More detailed Labor Force Participation Charts and Employment Ratio Charts  
U.S. Unemployment Rate. Seasonally Adjusted.
Total Labor Force Mlns Rate (%) Monthly Change (%pts) Year/Year Change (%pts)
July 2016 July 2017 July 2016 May 2017 June 2017 July 2017 May 2017 June 2017 July 2017 May 2017 June 2017 July 2017
All Ages (16+) 159.3 160.5 4.9 4.3 4.4 4.3 -0.1 0.1 -0.1 -0.4 -0.5 -0.6
16 to 19 years 5.9 5.9 15.6 14.3 13.3 13.2 -0.4 -1.0 -0.1 -1.9 -2.6 -2.4
20 to 24 years 15.2 15.3 8.9 6.7 7.5 7.4 -0.6 0.8 -0.1 -1.6 -1.1 -1.5
25 years and over 138.2 139.4 4.0 3.6 3.7 3.6 0.0 0.1 -0.1 -0.2 -0.3 -0.4
25 to 34 years 35.6 36.2 5.0 4.9 4.4 4.6 0.5 -0.5 0.2 -0.1 -0.7 -0.4
35 to 44 years 32.8 33.1 3.5 3.3 3.4 3.6 -0.3 0.1 0.2 -0.2 -0.4 0.1
45 to 54 years 33.8 33.6 3.5 3.2 3.6 3.2 -0.2 0.4 -0.4 -0.2 0.1 -0.3
55 years and over 36.0 36.6 3.7 3.1 3.2 3.2 -0.1 0.1 0.0 -0.2 -0.4 -0.5
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