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Origins of the Unemployment Rate: The Lasting Legacy of Measurement without Theory

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  • David Card

Abstract

The modern definition of unemployment emerged in the late 1930s from research conducted at the Works Progress Administration and the Census Bureau. According to this definition, people who are not working but actively searching for work are counted as unemployed. This concept was first used in the Enumerative Check Census, a follow-up sample for the 1937 Census of Unemployment, and continued with the Monthly Report on the Labor Force survey, begun in December 1939 by the Works Progress Administration. A similar definition is now used to measure unemployment around the world.

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  • David Card, 2011. "Origins of the Unemployment Rate: The Lasting Legacy of Measurement without Theory," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 552-557, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:aea:aecrev:v:101:y:2011:i:3:p:552-57
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    6. Moen, Jon, 1987. "The Labor of Older Men: A Comment," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 47(03), pages 761-767, September.
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    2. Debra L. Brucker & Nicholas G. Rollins & Andrew J. Houtenville, 2018. "Striving to Work," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 139(2), pages 541-558, September.
    3. Carneiro, Pedro & Lee, Sokbae & Reis, Hugo, 2020. "Please call me John: Name choice and the assimilation of immigrants in the United States, 1900–1930," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    4. Felder, Rahel & Sheldon, George, 2023. "Ein System zur laufenden Messung der Knappheitsverhältnisse auf beruflichen Arbeitsmärkten in der Schweiz," Working papers 2023/10, Faculty of Business and Economics - University of Basel.
    5. Clifford F. Thies, 2017. "Slip and Drift in Labor Statistics Since 2007," Econ Journal Watch, Econ Journal Watch, vol. 14(1), pages 121–132-1, January.
    6. Cristina Gabriela ZAMFIR, 2018. "Unemployment Prospective in Romania," Economics and Applied Informatics, "Dunarea de Jos" University of Galati, Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, issue 2, pages 79-86.
    7. Donald J. Hernandez & Jeffrey S. Napierala, 2020. "Disparities in U.S. Parental Employment Insecurity and Child Well-Being Across Income Groups: Before, During, and After the Great Recession," Child Indicators Research, Springer;The International Society of Child Indicators (ISCI), vol. 13(3), pages 741-775, June.
    8. Rebecca M. Aldrich & Debbie Laliberte Rudman & Na Eon (Esther) Park & Suzanne Huot, 2020. "Centering the Complexity of Long-Term Unemployment: Lessons Learned from a Critical Occupational Science Inquiry," Societies, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-22, September.
    9. Fernando Martins & Domingos Seward, 2019. "Into the heterogeneities in the Portuguese labour market: an empirical assessment," Working Papers w201908, Banco de Portugal, Economics and Research Department.
    10. Hugh Rockoff, 2019. "On the Controversies behind the Origins of the Federal Economic Statistics," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 33(1), pages 147-164, Winter.
    11. Anna Aizer & Shari Eli & Adriana Lleras-Muney & Keyoung Lee, 2020. "Do Youth Employment Programs Work? Evidence from the New Deal," NBER Working Papers 27103, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Süheyla Erikli & Serap Pelin Türkoğlu, 2021. "OECD Ülkelerinin İşgücü Piyasası Performans Analizi," Journal of Social Policy Conferences, Istanbul University, Faculty of Economics, vol. 0(80), pages 299-320, June.
    13. Li, Teng & Barwick, Panle Jia & Deng, Yongheng & Huang, Xinfei & Li, Shanjun, 2023. "The COVID-19 pandemic and unemployment: Evidence from mobile phone data from China," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 135(C).
    14. Kaloyan Ganev, 2014. "Early theories of business cycle and their role on the development of economics," Economic Thought journal, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences - Economic Research Institute, issue 3, pages 39-56.
    15. Poitras, Geoffrey, 2018. "The pre-history of econophysics and the history of economics: Boltzmann versus the marginalists," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 507(C), pages 89-98.

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