The total number of unemployed, plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force (including discouraged workers), plus the total number of people employed part-time for economic reasons, as a percentage of the civilian labor force plus all persons marginally attached to the labor force.
Bureau of Labor Statistics, Statistics from the Current Population Survey, Historical data for the “A” tables of the Employment Situation News Release. Breakdowns by gender, race, age, and educational attainment are produced by the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality, using microdata from the monthly Current Population Survey.
People are classified as unemployed if they do not have a job, have actively looked for work in the prior four weeks, and are currently available for work. Persons who are not working and are waiting to be recalled to a job from which they have been temporarily laid off are also counted as unemployed.
People are classified as marginally attached to the labor force if they are neither working nor looking for work but indicate that they want and are available for a job and have looked for work sometime in the past 12 months. Discouraged workers are a subset of marginally attached workers. People are classified as discouraged workers if they are not currently employed and are not looking for work, but give a job-market related reason for not currently looking for work (for example, they believe there are no jobs available to them in their line or work, or they have previously been unable to find work).
People working part-time for economic reasons are those who worked 1 to 34 hours during the survey’s reference week, and gave an economic reason for working part-time, such as slack work or unfavorable business conditions, inability to find full-time work, or seasonal declines in demand.
The labor force includes two main groups of people: those who are currently employed, and those who are not currently employed but have actively looked for work in the prior four weeks and are currently available for work. People who are not working and are waiting to be recalled to a job from which they have been temporarily laid off are also counted as part of the labor force.