*EMPLOYMENT AND UNEMPLOYMENT AMONG YOUTH - SUMMER 2010* [27 August 2010]

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/youth.nr0.htm

or

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/youth.pdf

[full-text, 8 pages]

From April to July 2010, the number of employed youth 16 to 24 years old

rose by

1.8 million to 18.6 million, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.

This year, the share of young people who were employed in July was 48.9 percent,

the lowest July rate on record for the series, which began in 1948. (The month

of July typically is the summertime peak in youth employment.) Unemployment among

youth increased by 571,000 between April and July , about half as much as in

each of the two previous summers. (Because this analysis focuses on the seasonal

changes in youth employment and unemployment that occur each spring and summer,

the data are not seasonally adjusted.)

Labor force

The youth labor force--16- to 24-year-olds working or actively looking for

work--grows sharply between April and July each year. During these months, large

numbers of high school and college students search for or take summer jobs,

and many graduates enter the labor market to look for or begin permanent employ-

ment. This summer, the youth labor force grew by 2.4 million, or 11.5 percent,

to a total of 22.9 million in July. (See table 1.)

The labor force participation rate for all youth--the proportion of the popula-

tion 16 to 24 years old working or looking for work--was 60.5 percent in July,

the lowest July rate on record. The July 2010 rate was down by 2.5 percent-

age points from July 2009 and 17.0 percentage points below the peak for that

month in 1989 (77.5 percent).

The July labor force participation rate for 16- to 24-year-old men, at 62.7

percent, was down by 2.2 percentage points from a year earlier, and the rate for

women, at 58.1 percent, was down by 3.0 percentage points over the year. For

several decades prior to 1989, the July labor force participation rate for young

men showed no clear trend, ranging from 81 to 86 percent. Since July 1989,

however, their participation rate for the month has trended down, falling by about

20 percentage points. The July labor force participation rate for young women

peaked in 1989 at 72.4 percent, following a long-term upward trend; their rate

has since fallen by about 14 percentage points.

The July participation rate for whites declined by 2.8 percentage points from

a year earlier, to 63.2 percent. The rate for blacks, at 51.6 percent, was down

slightly, and the rate for Hispanics, at 56.1 percent, decreased by 3.3 percent-

age points. For all three groups, labor force participation rates were substan-

tially lower than their peaks reached in July 1989. The participation rate for Asian

youth was 48.3 percent in July 2010, little changed from July 2009. (See table 2.)

AND MUCH MORE...including TABLES...

**************************************** Stuart Basefsky Director, IWS News Bureau Institute for Workplace Studies Cornell/ILR School 16 E. 34th Street, 4th Floor New York, NY 10016

Telephone: (607) 255-2703 Fax: (607) 255-9641 E-mail: smb6@cornell.edu ****************************************