Chart of the Week: Real Unemployment

During the Great Depression, unemployment neared 30% (37% of all non-farm workers).  Now, in the Second Great Depression, the government will only officially admit to a rate of about 10%.  Many economists believe that the official U3 number grossly underestimates the actual number of unemployed.  For one reason, the figure does not include those individuals who have been employed for extended periods of time.   Since they are considered to be out of the workforce since Clinton eliminated them in 1994.  U6 is a broader index that includes the underemployed and short-term discouraged workers.  But shadowstatistics.com provides us with a broader measure that includes all of the U3 and U6 categories. The blue line below is approaching the unemployment levels not seen since the First Great Depression: