Economy of The United States - Employment

Employment

There are approximately 154.4 million employed individuals in the US. Government is the largest employment sector with 22 million. Small businesses are the largest employer in the country representing 53% of US workers. The second largest share of employment belongs to large businesses that employ 38% of the US workforce. The private sector employs 91% of Americans. Government accounts for 8% of all US workers. Over 99% of all employing organizations in the US are small businesses. The 30 million small businesses in the U.S. account for 64% of newly created jobs (those created minus those lost). Jobs in small businesses accounted for 70% of those created in the last decade. The proportion of Americans employed by small business versus large business has remained relatively the same year by year as some small businesses become large businesses and just over half of small businesses survive more than 5 years. Amongst large businesses, several of the largest companies and employers in the world are American companies. Amongst them are Walmart, the largest company and the largest private sector employer in the world, which employs 2.1 million people world-wide and 1.4 million in the US alone.

There are nearly 30 million small businesses in the U.S. Minorities such as Hispanics, African Americans, Asian Americans, and Native Americans (35% of the country's population), own 4.1 million of the country's businesses. Minority-owned businesses generate almost $700 billion in revenue and employ almost 5 million workers in the U.S.

The median household income in the US as of 2008 is $52,029. About 284,000 working people in the US have two full-time jobs and 7.6 million have a part-time job in addition to their full-time employment. Of working individuals in the US, 12% belong to a labor union; most union members are government workers.

In May 2009, the unemployment rate was 9.4%. A broader measure of unemployment (taking into account marginally attached workers, those employed part-time for economic reasons, and discouraged workers) was 15.9%. In 2009 and 2010, following the financial crisis of 2007–2010, the emerging problem of jobless recoveries resulted in record levels of long-term unemployment with over 6 million workers looking for work longer than 6 months as of January, 2010. This particularly affected older workers. Since the recession's end in June 2009 in the United States, immigrants have gained 656,000 jobs, while U.S.-born workers lost more than a million jobs.

In April 2010, the official unemployment rate was 9.9%, but the government’s broader U-6 unemployment rate was 17.1%. In the period between February 2008 and February 2010, the number of people working part-time for economic reasons has increased by 4 million to 8.8 million, an 83% increase in part-time workers during the two-year period.

Female unemployment continued to be significantly lower than male unemployment (7.5% vs. 9.8%). The unemployment among Caucasians continues to be much lower than African American unemployment (at 8.5% vs. 15.8%). The youth unemployment rate was 18.5% in July 2009, the highest July rate since 1948. The unemployment rate of young African American men was 34.5% in October 2009. Officially, Detroit’s unemployment rate is 27%, but Detroit News suggests that nearly half of this city’s working-age population may be unemployed.

In 1955, 55% of Americans worked in services, between 30% and 35% in industry, and between 10% and 15% in agriculture. By 1980, over 65% were employed in services, between 25% and 30% in industry, and less than 5% in agriculture.