Or are they? According to new figures, they're all the rage.

We all had a feeling that the traditional notion of an “office” isn’t what it used to be, and now the latest from the U.S. Census Bureau confirms that more Americans than ever are working from home. In the last year that the government has figures for, 2005, the number of home-based workers jumped by almost two million, from 9.5 million in 1999 to 11.3 million in 2005. The report “Home Based Workers in the United States, 1999-2005” also shows that the number of people who worked exclusively from home jumped from 6.7 million to 8.1 million in that same period.

What this would seem to mean for employers is that workers are demanding more flexibility in their workplace. Among the top reasons cited in the 2005 census for reasons to work at home were “better child care arrangements,” “better arrangements for care of other family members” and “allows for school.”

But perhaps the biggest surprise is that it was most often a “requirement of the job” to work at home, according to 77 percent who did. Employers, it seems, want to redefine the workplace, too.

Another big surprise was the big incomes being pulled in by home-based workers: nearly half of them made $75,000 per year, or more. According to the bureau:

The most popular occupations among those who reported working at home were professional (25 percent), executive, administrative and managerial (22 percent) and sales (18 percent).

High-paying jobs were more likely to involve working at home for some or all of the work time. In 2005, 46 percent of people who said they worked at home some or all of the time earned at least $75,000 per year, compared with 34 percent of non-home workers who made at least that much. Those who worked both at home and in an office had the highest percentage of high-paying jobs — about 54 percent of whom made $75,000 or more annually in 2005.

But there was some trade-off: roughly a tenth of those who worked at home at least some of the time in 2005 said they worked 11 or more hours per day. Still, about a quarter of home-based workers felt they had flexibility in their work hours.

Chances are good that when the results from the 2010 census are in, those numbers will be even greater. Business Week noted that the number of people who are self-employed and working exclusively at home in 2005 increased from 3.47 million to 4.34 million , and they see this as further evidence that the so-called “homepreneur” trend .

In his first write-up on the phenomenon last year, John Tozzi said:

More than half of all U.S. businesses are based at home. These companies often are dismissed as quaint hobbyist ventures, but new research suggests that’s a mistake. An estimated 6.6 million home-based enterprises provide at least half of their owners’ household income. Together these “homepreneurs” employ one in 10 private-sector workers, and by many measures they’re just as competitive as their counterparts in commercial spaces.

With so many layoffs, will more and more workers pack it up and go home, and what kind of brain drain could that create for traditional businesses? Too early to say, maybe, but it’s clear that the definition of the American workforce is continuing to shift.

It’s official: we’re in for a long roller-coaster ride on the job market. After an unexpected drop in unemployment numbers, the government has released new figures that found the number of people filing for unemployment rising once again last week, to 473,000—a gain of 31,000.

The hope, of course, had been that we’d seen the worst of this recession, and that job numbers would steadily improve. The new info means layoffs aren’t slowing as fast as we might have hoped, but it doesn’t change the general consensus that the job picture is improving. The four-week average for new jobless claims dropped by 1,500 to 467,500, and that’s among the best numbers we’ve seen throughout his whole recession (keep in mind, the total of jobs lost is now believed to be around 8.4 million since the end of 2007).

But it’s going to be a long haul. With that in mind, Caroline M.L. Potter over at Yahoo has written a great article about “Super Staying Power” in the workplace.

Sometimes our culture is so focused on upward mobility that we forget about the importance of holding on to the job we have. Naturally, getting the best information possible out there to jobseekers is important, since generally they’re under much more pressure to make a job situation work. It’s also important for human resource professionals to keep up with the latest on how to keep employees happy and maintain an efficient, productive workplace. Even in this job market, there are way too many talented people looking for the Next Best Thing for anyone to rest on their laurels.

But what about employees keeping their bosses happy? In times like these, that’s more important than ever. Job security is at a premium right now. Potter quotes Jason Seiden, author of “Super Staying Power: What You Need to Become Valuable and Resilient at Work,” and the most interesting thing about the top points addressed in her article is that they’re not necessarily the common-sense arguments one might expect. In fact, they’re practically counter-intuitive.

For instance, it might seem obvious that if someone is not exactly clear on his or her work goals, the best thing to do would be to seek as much clarity as possible. But maybe not. According to point number two, “Don’t ask for clarity”:

Nobody seems to get enough feedback or direction these days, and if your workplace is in flux, as many are, you’ll probably get even less. Get over it, says Seiden. ‘When a worker asks for ‘all the details’ about a project, her boss is going to see a lack of critical thinking, a lack of being able to handle ambiguity.’ And, a lack of independence.

He urges professionals to create their own environments at work and resolve problems themselves, ‘whether your boss is a micromanager or not.’”

The other points addressed are “have confidence,” “use positive language” and “find passion where you are.” It’s all good advice, and in this shifting job market, a good reminder that staying focused on one’s present job situation can sometimes be priceless. Change is constant, and not always a bad thing by any means. But a strong showing in one’s current job performance can set up great things down the road.

Every time there’s an economic downturn, the debate over a shorter work week becomes a hot topic. It’s back again with a report from the New Economics Foundation which claims that cutting employee hours nearly in half can cure what ails the global economy. The British think tank’s “21 Hours” study begins with the assertion that:

A ‘normal’ working week of 21 hours could help to address a range of urgent, interlinked problems: overwork, unemployment, over-consumption, high carbon emissions, low well-being, entrenched inequalities, and the lack of time to live sustainably, to care for each other, and simply to enjoy life.”

The report argues that the current work week is arbitrary, and that despite the reduction in paid hours, “experiments with shorter working hours suggest that they can be popular where conditions are stable and pay is favorable.”

In an interview  with the BBC, “21 Hours” co-author Anna Coote claims a radical rethinking of the work week would benefit both employers and workers, saying “we could even become better employees—less stressed, more in control, happier in our jobs and more productive.” Meanwhile, the foundation’s policy director Andrew Simms went for the crowd-pleaser: “Hands up who wouldn’t like a four day weekend?”

Since the current recession began in 2008, human resource experts in the U.S. have been tossing around this same idea. The HR Hero ezine published a great article on the subject this month, which jumped off from the assertion by economist Dean Baker that even President Obama’s own economic team doesn’t believe his stimulus package can heal the job market anytime soon. With employers already worried about possible future layoffs, Claudia N. Lombardo writes, shorter workweeks offer an alternative, and she addresses some of the HR worries:

A big concern for employers, particularly in a failing economy, is whether shortening the workweek reduces productivity. Employers may wonder how their company will continue producing at the same level with a reduction in employee hours.

Interestingly enough, according to Aaron Newton, author of “The 4 Day Work Week: Working to Live, Not Living to Work,” a recent survey of more than 10,000 workers revealed that on average, people spend more than two hours each day on personal matters (e.g., surfing the Web or calling friends) while at work. That adds up to 10 hours a week. The study shows that a four-day workweek wouldn’t necessarily reduce production if the focus remains on work.”

Lombardo cites statistics from around the world to back up the argument that maximum time spent on the job does not necessarily equal maximum productivity. If France, with its 35-hour work week, and Norway, with a labor base that works 26 percent fewer hours per year than Americans do, can produce a greater gross domestic product per work hour than the U.S., doesn’t it follow that “face time” at the office may be overrated?

Maybe, but keep in mind that this debate has been going on for nearly a century in the United States. In fact, it was 1926 when Henry Ford famously predicted that “the short week is bound to come because without it the country will not be able to absorb its production and stay prosperous.”

But that major shift in the U.S. workplace never did come. The idea bubbles up every few years, and employers often seem ready to pull the trigger. In a 1997 U.S. News/Bozell survey, almost two-thirds of managers polled said shorter work hours would make workers more productive. But uncertainty on the part of both businesses and their employees has kept it from gaining traction in the mainstream.

It could be that the Great Recession forces a major rethinking in our basic notion of the work week. There are only so many creative alternatives to layoffs, and shorter hours at least offers a certain win-win situation. Last year, the New York Times reported that some employers were trying to save jobs by switching their employees to a 24-hour work week. The article quotes human resource experts and economic analysts, and basically suggests that a strategy of flexibility in these economic times will beat out “the layoff mentality”:

Kim S. Cameron, a professor at the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, found in doing research that the more that companies opt for flexibility in downsizing, the better they fare when the economy turns around.

‘When firms can deliver the message that their employees are human resources, rather than human costs or liabilities, they see higher profitability, productivity, quality, customer satisfaction and employee loyalty over the long term,’ Professor Cameron said.”

Sometimes a small change can mean big change for the employment market. That’s what analysts are saying about the January unemployment numbers released last Friday by the Department of Labor.

Is the news all good for jobseekers? No, but it’s much better than anyone expected. Consider this: After losing 150,000 jobs in December, the U.S. economy lost only 20,000 jobs last month, a small statistical change that could signal much bigger things—most notably, that after a string of brutal jobs reports, the worst may be over. After revising its numbers from the end of last year, the Labor Department determined that unemployment fell to 9.7 percent last month from 10 percent.

Job-market watchers have jumped all over the unexpected good news. On the White House blog, Council of Economic Advisers chair Christina Romer wrote that “while unemployment remains a severe problem, today’s employment report contains encouraging signs of gradual labor market healing.”

Employment did rise in a few areas, including retail trade and temporary help employment, as well as manufacturing. The results of the Labor Department’s survey of households showed that 541,000 more Americans had work in January. But Romer’s choice of words may be an even bigger indicator in itself, as it marks the first time anyone analyzing the labor market has really talked about “healing” for the jobs outlook. Could the jobless recovery finally be getting back its jobs?

There are several caveats, of course. First of all, as Romer herself notes, the DOL’s revised numbers revealed that more than a million more jobs than previously thought have been lost in this recession. The new numbers suggest 8.4 million jobs have been lost in this recession, and it will likely take several years for all of those jobs to be restored to the economy.

But let’s look at that in a different light. Economic analysts believe we could add as many as 1.5 million jobs to the U.S. economy this year. For proof that 2010 is beginning to show signs of an improved outlook, look no further than CNN/Fortune’s new list of the best companies to work for in 2010. Out of those, almost a quarter have at least 500 openings each, which equals almost 88,000 jobs. In other words, Fortune’s top companies are hiring.

The top rankings this year, by the way, went to:

1. SAS
2. Edward Jones
3. Wegmans
4. Google
5. Nugget Market
6. DreamWorks Animation
7. NetApp
8. Boston Consulting Group
9. Qualcomm
10. Camden Property Trust

To some degree, this year’s list of top companies is just a reshuffling of last year’s, but it’s interesting to consider who moved and who didn’t. North-Carolina-based software firm SAS jumped all the way from #20 to #1, while Edward Jones remained at #2 and Google held at #4. Camden Property Trust made the biggest upward move in the top 10, from #41 to #10. Meanwhile, Cisco Systems, Genentech and Goldman Sachs all fell out of the top 10.

Unlike 2009’s list, not all of the top 10 companies had positive job growth this year, and the upticks were generally small in any case.

However, judging from what the companies are saying about their hiring for this year — and all of those openings — expect that to change on next year’s list.

I don’t generally think of myself as a movie reviewer, but my critique of “Up in the Air” — written, of course, from my perspective as the CEO of an outplacement firm — has gotten some attention, first in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and then in the online Wall Street Journal.

Wrote the Journal’s Josh Beckerman of our press release on the movie (which this week was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture):

Best of all is RiseSmart’s debunking of the theory that “laid-off workers can be mollified with generic pep talks.” The company invokes Clooney’s line that “anyone who ever built an empire or changed the world sat where you are sitting, and it’s because they sat there that they were able to do it.”

RiseSmart says “the thought that this kind of condescending pep talk would ‘work’ on people is insulting to those who have actually had to go through this experience.” Right on. The downsizing victims in the movie are too easily impressed - the cynical J.K. Simmons character is rapidly persuaded about the merits of opening a restaurant during the credit crunch, and there’s a queasy suggestion that layoffs are okay because you get to spend more time with your family.

Since Hollywood doesn’t make many movies about HR consultants, my 15 minutes of fame as a film critic is probably over. So Roger Ebert, don’t quit your day job.

But I would like to add one more point about the movie, which I’ve come to upon reflection. The unflattering treatment of HR consultants in “Up in the Air” might normally be dismissed as standard Hollywood storytelling. But the movie’s popularity and Oscar nod suggest it has struck a chord of authenticity with audiences.

Why so? I think it’s at least partly because hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of workers who have been laid-off in recent years have been less than pleased with the quality — and the results — of the help they have received from traditional outplacement firms. It’s the real story of old-school outplacement, which the Wall Street Journal told a few months back.

So ironically, for all its inaccuracies, “Up in the Air” points to the reason I started RiseSmart Transition Concierge in the first place — to make outplacement services more accountable to both displaced workers and their employers, by getting employees back to work sooner.

Our recent blog post about “Up in the Air” inspired Mackenzie Carpenter of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette to call us for a story she was writing about the movie and its portrayal of corporate layoffs.

Here are a few excerpts from Mackenzie’s piece, which appeared in Sunday’s paper:

Just how accurate a portrayal of your friendly corporate terminator is “Up in the Air” anyway?

Not very, say those who actually do it for a living.

“A lot of human resources people were excited when we found out that George Clooney was going to be playing one of us, and the movie is very good — but it doesn’t reflect HR consulting as I know it,” said Sanjay Sathe, founder and CEO of RiseSmart, a Silicon Valley-based outplacement firm, which provides job-search help and career coaching to laid-off employees.

“People who are laid off don’t want a generic pep talk from someone they don’t know. I can’t imagine that tactic being as effective in real life as it’s portrayed in the movie.”…

[T]he film’s premise that people doing the firing are emotionally detached is not true, argued Mr. Sathe.

“People go into human resources, as opposed to, say, finance or accounting, because they enjoy working with people, they genuinely like people and empathize with them … my experience is that layoffs are usually very difficult emotionally on HR people.”

Still, as the economy limps along, will employees be seeing more strangers — handsome or not — come to bid them so long and have fun with that gourmet cooking gig?

Despite recent growth in the outsourced human resources industry, most companies will continue to handle firings themselves — with consultants brought in to help plan the layoffs or, like his company, to help them find new jobs, Mr. Sathe said. And there’s one small detail in the film that cuts a little too close for comfort, he added.

“I wish Clooney’s character were not called a transition consultant in the film because we call our employees transition specialists.”

Just as Mr. Clooney delivers inspirational speeches to those he’s just fired, “We also give pep talks — not about building empires, but about how marketable they are based on a review of their backgrounds,” Mr. Sathe said.

“We might say, ‘Hey, have you considered applying for a job in the health care sector? Because your experience is great and would transfer very well to that industry.’ But I guess that kind of pep talk would not sell many movie tickets, would it?”

To follow up just a bit on the topic of empathy vs. detachment, I’ve recently read critiques of “Up in the Air” that argue that it’s not so much Clooney’s character, but the movie itself, that is detached and glib in dealing with corporate layoffs.

As Salon’s critic puts its:

What [director Jason] Reitman doesn’t seem to get is that [the film's] real-world testimonies are only a half-twist away from the slickster line of goods — “Losing your job is the best thing for you. Really!” — that Ryan’s character specializes in.

When Ryan is spouting these prefab pearls of wisdom, they’re treacherous falsehoods; when real people use them to make the best of a bad situation, they’re enlightenment. Reitman can’t even see the condescension in that.

By putting these faces in front of us — faces of people who have, most likely, suffered through some pretty rough times in real life — he isn’t making a grand statement about the precarious world we live in; he’s turning the misfortunes of others into a gimmick, a convenient hook on which to hang his movie.

That makes him less honorable than his smooth-talking, high-flying antihero. At least Ryan Bingham knows he’s selling us a line of bull.

Personally, I liked the film. But I suppose you could argue that if Reitman really gave a hoot about the fate of those laid off, he would have attempted to make a film like Time Out, which explores the pain of an executive who loses his job (but can’t bring himself to tell his family) in excruciating detail.

At the very least, I’d put the empathy of HR folks up against that of Hollywood types any day of the week.

It’s been a difficult year for everyone, and the economic downturn has affected how companies celebrate the holiday season. In a time of layoffs and furloughs, it just doesn’t seem right to celebrate lavishly.

Still, even if you’re mentally prepared for a scale-back, the severity of the actual numbers may surprise you. The annual Challenger Gray & Christmas survey showed that just 62% of businesses will have a holiday party this year. That’s down from 77% in 2008, and 90% in 2007 – meaning that 28% of businesses have dropped the custom in just two years. Want more proof? In her recent post “The 2009 Holiday Party: Holding On…” Ann Bares of Compensation Force cited some research from BLR about the state of the 2009 holiday party:

• For 37% of employers, the budget will be about the same.
• For 24% of employers, the budget will be smaller.
• 20% say they had no holiday party last year and won’t have one this year either.
• 14% say they had one last year but won’t this year.

In a nod to tough times, Coca-Cola execs said that they would be making a donation to a hunger-prevention charity instead of throwing a holiday bash – for the second year in a row. Individual departments will be encouraged to throw potluck lunches to celebrate instead, reported business publication TheStreet.com.

Some business owners who are really getting into the right spirit this year were James and Melinda Hemdon, profiled in the Orange County Register story “O.C. businesses trim, not end, year-end parties. ” The couple, who own Scuba.com, used to throw a catered dinner cruise. This year, though, in an attempt to scale back, they’re cooking a homemade dinner at their own house for staff.

It seems to me that employees who are facing more work for less pay, along with the loss of colleagues and an uncertain future, are likely to appreciate these gestures of restraint very much. It’s good for members of an organization to get together and appreciate what they have together, without spending money in such a way that calls their judgment into question. “Low-key” seems to be the watchword as we close out a very tough 2009.

How is your company handling the 2009 holiday party? Are you part of the 14% that have retired the office party this year? Do you have any creative ideas for celebrating on a budget? Please share your thoughts in the comments.

There are just 45 days left in 2009, and for many managers, it’s time for employee reviews. (Searching for “performance reviews” on Twitter at this time of year leads you to countless people who are either busy writing them, or nervously waiting to receive one.) It may have crossed your mind to skip or postpone performance reviews this year – as the business landscape keeps changing, the goals you made 12 months ago may seem unrealistic, or perhaps your organization has a freeze on salary increases. But no matter how bad the economy is, you cannot afford to miss giving feedback to your people.

Here are five compelling reasons why.

1. Simple legalities. You expect your employees to live by the handbook? Then so should management. If you have a written policy committing to an annual review, then provide the review. Skipping it means risking your reputation in court against a dismissed worker, who may portray the skipped review as a sign of poor management or bad communication.
2. Retain top talent. In tough times, you need your best people more than ever. Instead of avoiding their review because of economic turmoil, make a point of meeting with them and letting them know how much you appreciate them, even if the salary and bonus situation is not what it once was.
3. Put underperformers on warning. You can’t afford to have poor performers on board, so use the review as a chance to help them grow into a productive member of the team, or set the stage for their departure.
4. Re-align employees with the big-picture goals. Reviews aren’t just for the employees; they’re also a great time to revisit the company’s larger goals and make certain that the work being done reflects them.
5. Prepare for future difficulty or change. If the time should come in the future for a sale of the business, or a mass layoff, having recent, reliable documentation on hand will streamline the process. Same goes if new leadership is brought aboard.

No matter how rocky the economic outlook, your employees deserve to have a formal check-in on their progress. Plus, many aspects of the performance review directly benefit management (it’s not just handing out raises!). So don’t even consider skipping this important step, no matter how much you may be dreading performance review time in a bad economy. Evaluations can actually help you with your goals for the organization!

For more information:

• You can’t afford to skip reviews A well-argued case from Entrepreneur magazine.
• Should We Skip Performance Appraisals This Year? From 2008, but still very relevant to the issues we’re facing one year later.
• Don’t skip mid-year performance reviews Written about mid-year reviews, but this Wall St. Journal piece applies to year-end reviews equally well.
  

It seems counter-intuitive. Even as the unemployment rate soars and nearly 16 million Americans find themselves out of work, many HR professionals are having a hard time filling their open positions. It’s not a quantity issue –- any ad HR posts is sure to result in hundreds, if not thousands, of resumes — or even a quality issue. It’s a qualifications issue.

In times of change, industries morph more quickly than people do, resulting in a mismatch between available jobs and job candidates. We look to the Dow Jones Newswire for some analysis:

Economists say the main problem is a mismatch between available work and people qualified to do it. Millions of jobs with attractive pay and benefits that once drew legions of workers to the auto industry, construction, Wall Street and other sectors are gone, probably for good. And those who lost those jobs generally lack the right experience for new positions popping up in health care, energy and engineering. Many of these specialized jobs were hard to fill even before the recession. But during downturns, recruiters tend to become even choosier, less willing to take financial risks on untested workers.

The problem is definitely more pronounced in emerging industries:

With job openings largely concentrated in specialized industries like health care, green technology and energy, some employers say the problem is finding qualified workers, which are in short supply. Meanwhile, they are inundated with eager candidates from other industries who lack the skills and experience that the job requires.

In the above article, “Great job openings, no candidates: Hiring managers struggle to find employees, even as millions of jobs seekers are desperate for work,” CNN interviewed a Director of Human Resources who is in charge of hiring Registered Nurses and Home Health Aides. The positions pay between $30,000 and $45,000, but despite a  glut of applicants, many have been open for six months or more.

“We get tons of resumes,” says the HR Director. The problem, she says, is that they are bombarded by applications that lack the two years’ experience required. The result is that the positions stay unfilled, even as HR employees spend insupportable amounts of time searching through resumes to find appropriate candidates.

The problem is serious for people on both sides of the hiring desk, and it is not likely to go away anytime soon. New data just released by the Labor Department shows that as of September 2009, there were 6.1 unemployed persons competing for each job opening. At the beginning of the economic slowdown, not even two years ago, there were only 1.7 workers competing for each job opening. That means competition for jobs more than tripled since December 2007!

The article goes on to remind us that during the last three major recessions (in 1982, 1991 and 2001), it took more than a year for the unemployment rate to peak after the downturns officially ended. This is partially a reaction to economic forces, and partly because it takes time to transition laid-off workers to the industries that need them. Check out the Associated Press story “Even as layoffs persist, some good jobs go begging“:

It can take a year or more for a laid-off worker to gain the training and education to switch industries. That means health care jobs are going unfilled even as laid-off workers in the auto, construction or financial services industries seek work. “So we have this army of the unemployed,” without the necessary skills, [said the expert interviewed].

We are looking at a society-wide problem that is only going to be corrected with the passage of time and with resources devoted to re-training displaced workers. In the meantime, Human Resources is facing massive drains on its own resources.

How is your department handling screening large amounts of applicants? Is your organization offering any training, or working with any re-training agencies? Is it difficult to explain to co-workers outside of HR why it may be taking extra time to find the right match? We’re interested in hearing your strategies and your success stories.

Last week, we saw the Department of Labor reveal the worst unemployment statistics the U.S. has faced since 1983, with a total of 15.7 million Americans officially out of work and looking. The new national average of 10.2% is an important psychological threshold — but what’s even more shocking to think about is that it is an average. Many locations and demographics are experiencing much scarier numbers. Who is most and least affected by this plague of joblessness? What is the demographic makeup of the unemployment line?

The numbers vary from state to state, of course. For instance, RiseSmart’s home state of California has experienced 12.2% unemployment recently. Michigan, Nevada, and Rhode Island are also suffering. However, states such as the Dakotas, Utah, Iowa, and Nebraska are all doing comparatively well.

But regional differences are to be expected as local economies go through boom and bust times. It’s the demographic numbers that will really make you look twice. The New York Times has published a thought-provoking interactive chart that graphs out unemployment rates for different groups of Americans, called “The Jobless Rate for People Like You.” You can adjust the chart for race, gender, age, and education levels and get 12-month averages for that demographic, current as of September 2009 (they don’t reflect our latest awful reality of 10+%, but still show a sobering truth).

The variations are shocking. Truly, not all groups have felt the recession equally. Make up an imaginary unemployed person; give them an age, a gender, a race, and an education. See what their chances are; then change an element or two.

Take away that college degree, or change the race, and you’ll quickly find that some groups have unemployment rates much higher than the 10% we’re all worrying over. The highest unemployment rate –- a staggering 48.5% –- is suffered by black males under age 24 without a high school diploma. Their female counterparts (same race, age, and education) also faced discouraging odds at 36.8%, but the change of gender alone makes a difference of 11.7%.

Education helps, because these same groups, had they finished high school, would be facing just 25.8% unemployment. Before you pin it all on dropping out of school, though, consider a schoolmate of theirs: a white male of the same age who didn’t complete high school. The white dropout, statistically, faces just 25.6% unemployment (virtually the same as the black male who completes his diploma). If the white student finishes high school, it drops to 15.5%.

There are many more dismaying inequities to be found by experimenting with the chart. The unemployment line of America, according to these numbers, contains more men than women; more youth than elders; a vastly unequal representation of races; and an inordinate amount of the less-educated. In fact, education is the factor that affects these rates the most. There are definitely trends based on age, race, and gender, but possession of a high school or college degree seems to do the most, across the board, to increase one’s chances of getting and keeping a job.

For more unemployment statistics, the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Unemployment Statistics is an excellent place to start. You can examine national, state, and local statistics through the lens of various demographics, and research mass layoffs, too. If you are interested in how the unemployment crisis is affecting older workers, the Urban Institute has produced comprehensive “Unemployment Statistics on Older Americans.”

Whether you are a job-seeker or a Human Resource professional (or both –- it’s known to happen from time to time), it is important to know the real face of joblessness. Our country is facing the worst unemployment crisis in decades: probably the worst any of us will see in our careers. We owe it to ourselves and to the people we meet and consider working with to understand what is really going on in our offices, our unemployment system, and our society.