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Comment by tsantero | Hacker News Reader

> Can anyone find a source for the unemployment rate of high school graduates? 22.9% is astoundingly high, if true.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics is always a great place to look.

Employment status of the civilian population 25 years and over by educational attainment: http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t04.htm

According to this (last updated Dec 02, 2011) the not-seasonally adjusted aggregate unemployment for anyone who holds a HS diploma (regardless of higher level education) is 20%.

Edit: I didn't mean to cause any confusion by aggregating the "non-hs-dropout" stats, so let me make it clearer:

Level of Education : Unemployment Rate High School Dropout: 12.7% High School Diploma: 8.4% Some College/AA Deg: 7.4% Bachelors or Higher: 4.2%

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I must be reading it wrong, because I see 8.4% unadjusted for high school graduates in Nov 2011. How are you calculating aggregate regardless of higher level education? I don't understand how you can just add the high school, some college, and bachelors to get 20%.

> I don't understand how you can just add the high school, some college, and bachelors to get 20%.

That is exactly what I did. In my original response, I wrote aggregate unemployment for anyone who holds a HS diploma (regardless of higher level education) is 20%. I wasn't trying to be misleading, I just thought it was interesting to see that the aggregate for all non-high school dropouts.

Anyway, after looking at the article again, the author claims the unemployment stats come from 2009-2010 US Census and a study done at the Georgetown Center on Education and Workforce, broken down by age group. The BLS scope is obviously much larger and current.

Why would you add together averages?

The aggregate unemployment rate for those groups together is 7.4%, not 20%.

When you are browsing the Bureau of Labor Statistics, it is important to look at the several metrics they measure for unemployment. BLS reports U-3 as "The Unemployment Rate", but many people feel that U-6 is a better measure of unemployment.

I don't know where you are seeing that. According to the data you linked to, the highest unadjusted unemployment rate in November 2011 (in any category) is 12.7% for "Less than a high school diploma".

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