alt Hacker NewsYou can also look at the prime-age employment-population numbers, which show ages 25 to 54.
It shows nearly 20% unemployment rates.
I think this is a better number, personally, than the 4.4% one that conveniently skips out on so many. It's always felt like an "optics" number to me. Like asking themselves how much can they possibly massage the data to look as good as possible.
I think it's meaningful to consider the amount of people who are unemployed even if they're not looking for work or can't work. It better highlights that there are societal level problems that are preventing a lot of these people from working when I imagine most of them would like to be - they just can't because of childcare needs, disability, incarceration, lack of access to opportunities, domestic abuse, etc.