Business: The New Face of Unemployment

BY the standards of past times of trouble in the U.S. economy, the current unemployment rate of 5.5% is not particularly high. That fact does not, of course, cushion the psychological shock experienced by people who have been fired. Many got their first jobs during the buoyant 1960s, have never been laid off before and do not quite know what has hit them. In many ways, today's unemployed are different from those of earlier years. Though members of minority groups and blue-collar workers are the most vulnerable to layoffs, a surprising number of jobless people are unpoor and unblack.

White Losses. All...

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