Policymakers across the political spectrum recognize that the official unemployment rate fails to fully reflect the true state of economic opportunity in America. On Friday, December 12 at 2:00 p.m. ET, Alan Krueger, Bendheim Professor of Economics and Public Affairs at Princeton University and former chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers; Erica Groshen, commissioner at the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor; Diana Furchtgott-Roth, director of Economics21 and senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research and former chief economist of the U.S. Department of Labor; and Elise Gould, senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute, will take an in-depth look at the current state of the labor market in America today. They will examine how well the unemployment figures reflect the reality for American workers on the ground, whether the figures adequately inform the public and policymakers about the employment situation, and discuss potential ways the statistical measures could be modernized and improved. Nicole Woo, Director of Domestic Policy at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, will moderate.
To help capture the true health of the U.S. labor market, EPI has developed the Missing Workers estimate. Missing workers are potential workers who, because of weak job opportunities, are neither employed nor actively seeking a job. EPI analyzes who these workers are by age and gender and calculates an unemployment rate as if these workers were actively looking for work. Currently, there are around 5.8 million missing workers. Were these workers counted in the official unemployment rate, it would be 9.2 percent, instead of 5.8 percent.
WHAT: Panel discussion on the importance of modernizing America’s unemployment rate
WHO: Erica Groshen, Commissioner, Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor
Diana Furchtgott-Roth, Director of Economics21, Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research, and former chief economist of the U.S. Department of Labor under President George W. Bush
Alan Krueger, Bendheim Professor of Economics and Public Affairs, Princeton University, and former Chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers under President Barack Obama
Elise Gould, Senior Economist, Economic Policy Institute
Moderated by: Nicole Woo, Director of Domestic Policy, Center for Economic and Policy Research
WHEN: Friday, December 12 at 2:00 p.m. ET
WHERE: 2237 Rayburn House Office Building
To RSVP for the event, or to request more information, please contact Erik Sperling at Rep. Conyers’ office at Erik.Sperling@mail.house.gov or 5-5126, or Jeff Wieand at Rep. Fitzpatrick’s office at Jeff.Wieand@mail.house.gov or ext. 5-4276.