If it feels like the recovery that started over 3 years ago isn’t really going anywhere, there’s a reason you might be thinking that.
This is a graph of the percentage of the population that is employed. The exact description is civilian employment as a percent of the population. That means what proportion of the population is employed.
Check it out:
The participation rate dropped drastically during the recession and it has essentially not moved since. Something similar happened after the 1960 recession, but then the drop wasn’t as bad and by this much time into the recovery there was an uptrend.
This is a linear graph of the data that was presented differently in a discussion at this post .
Did you know that the St. Louis Fed has hundreds of these kinds of graphs readily available? I’m feeling like a kid in a candy store. So many yummy choices…
Big hat tip to Carpe Diem.