The Part-Time Nation

Great chart showing the remarkable spike higher in the number of people in the U.S. working part-time for economic reasons. According to the latest BLS numbers, 3.4 million were added to the lists in the most recent report -- that's on top, obviously, of the 524,000 headline figure.

Comments

[adAstra:]

At first glance, the chart looks extremely disturbing. However, if you look closer, it only has raw data that can be quite misleading.

The chart would be far more useful if the numbers were adjusted; e.g. as a percentage of the total workforce, or of the total population, etc.

The sharp spike in 2009 is disturbing either way, but it may not be higher as a percentage of the workforce when compared to the peaks in the early 80s/90s.

Is there any chance we could see a chart with percentages?

Jan 09 02:00 PM

[john s. gordon:]

since the corporations have moved so many of our jobs to asia latin america etc. we end up with a lot of well trained highly educated people who are overqualified for any known job.
> jack

Jan 10 08:24 AM

[scotty1560:]

Very disappointing what has happened with our work force...

the job markets are getting more and more outsourced globally and
domestically more people are forced in to difficult sales positions with
little or no benefits or security. Making matters worse they flood the
salespeople into the same position leaving a very tiny piece of pie
for that salesperson to survive.

The country is obviously in free fall with few answers. By transferring so
much wealth to the top of the food chain we have simply bled our
working class out of existence...that will be the legacy of this era.
The era of cheap money is over....the pain is only beginning I am afraid.
By greedily killing of the little fish...eventually the big fish will starve to.

Jan 10 11:32 PM