Employment News Grim

By Richard Shank

The jobless rate is rising in the United States. In October, over 10 million people were unemployed, and 1.3 million of them were ages 55 and older. In general, workers over the age of 55 experienced perhaps the steepest declines in employment during the last quarter of 2008.

In total, 240,000 non-farm jobs were lost in the month of October alone. Because older workers often drop out of the workforce completely when they lose jobs, they are often not counted among the ranks of unemployed. The unemployment rate in October was 6.5% overall and 4.5% for workers over the age of 55; but despite the numbers of 55 plus workers remaining lower, they still experienced the sharpest decline in employment. It is comparable only to a similar drop in employment experienced by 25- to 34-year-old workers.

Once older workers become unemployed, it takes them longer to find new jobs. Nearly one-third of unemployed workers over the age of 55 have been out of work for 27 weeks or more, which is an increase from 27.5% the month before. The average duration of unemployment for older workers is 25.9 weeks, which is four weeks longer than that of younger workers. And it appears that these trends will continue into the new year over the short-term.

Source: AARP Fact Sheet

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