Is Unemployment Really 19%? Your Tactical Asset Allocation Should Reflect Economic Reality

Several weeks ago, a comment provider ripped into me for being a left-wing nut job. What did I do to draw his ire?I explained that the tapering of QE3 and the 0.25% rate hike bump – modest stimulus removal efforts on the surface – adversely impacted everything from currencies to commodities, sovereign credit to corporate credit, equity prices to equity valuation.

Today, I am taking aim at the 4.9% – an endeavor that may spark angry comments about my right-wing wacko credentials. Who are “the 4.9%?” They do not represent an income bracket. Rather, 4.9% is the headline data point on unemployed Americans.

At the risk of ruffling political feathers, shouldn’t we have a more honest discussion about the well-being of the labor force? The number of civilians who are employed or who are actively looking for work is 62.7%, down from 66% in December of 2007 before the Great Recession. This means that millions and millions of working-aged people who wish to work have stopped doing so. What’s more, it would be disingenuous to dismiss everyone who cannot find desirable work as “retirees” or “students.”

The economic reality on employment is sobering. We can remove all of the 16-24 year old individuals from the picture, pretending that each and every person in this age group is a “student.” In a similar vein, we can pull out each civilian in the 55-plus category and assign each with the tag of “retiree.” Yet you would still come up with 19% of 25-54 year-olds who are actively looking for work and who are not employed. That’s 19%.

There’s more. The 81% participation rate in this demographic is far worse than the 84.5% participation rate in 2000 or the 83.5% in 2008. In essence, fewer 25-54 year old workers are working today in 2016 than during the Great Recession.

Now, before left-of-center voters become incensed, let’s identify a very positive trend in employment: the U-6 unemployment rate. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) offers a broader snapshot of unemployment with its U-6 measure which incorporates discouraged workers and marginally attached workers. In addition to those who recently lost their job and/or who filed for unemployment benefits, there are people who want to work, but who have given up on the job hunt, searched in the past 12 months or settled on a part-time gig where a full-time job could not be found.