Unemployment numbers are counted based on how many people are collecting unemployment.
Unemployment insurance claims aren’t used to measure the unemployment rate in the US. But I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump thinks they are… Nor would I be surprised if he tries (or is trying) to change the measure so that it is based on unemployment claims.
To be clear I’m not saying the US’s unemployment numbers are good—they are distorted to make the unemployment number look smaller than it is. One issue is that People must be actively looking for work to be considered “unemployed”, otherwise they aren’t part of the “labor force” and don’t count at all. It doesn’t matter if they are capable of work, want to work, and spent a year straight looking for work; if they aren’t actively looking now, they don’t count. Additionally, if a person is doing any work at all—even a few hours a week at minimum wage, or doing a bit of unpaid work for a family business—they are considered an employed member of the labor force. It doesn’t matter if they are broke, homeless, and desperately looking for a job; they count as an employed member of the labor force.
Unemployment insurance claims aren’t used to measure the unemployment rate in the US. But I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump thinks they are… Nor would I be surprised if he tries (or is trying) to change the measure so that it is based on unemployment claims.
To be clear I’m not saying the US’s unemployment numbers are good—they are distorted to make the unemployment number look smaller than it is. One issue is that People must be actively looking for work to be considered “unemployed”, otherwise they aren’t part of the “labor force” and don’t count at all. It doesn’t matter if they are capable of work, want to work, and spent a year straight looking for work; if they aren’t actively looking now, they don’t count. Additionally, if a person is doing any work at all—even a few hours a week at minimum wage, or doing a bit of unpaid work for a family business—they are considered an employed member of the labor force. It doesn’t matter if they are broke, homeless, and desperately looking for a job; they count as an employed member of the labor force.