Chart: Duration of unemployment

In August, 42.0 percent of unemployed persons had been jobless for 27 weeks or more, the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics reported. Persons who had been unemployed for 27 weeks or more made up 44.9 percent of the unemployed in July and 45.5 percent in June.

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The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks and over) declined by 323,000 over the month of August to 6.2 million.

The number of unemployed persons (14.9 million) and the unemployment rate (9.6 percent) were little changed in August. From May through August, the jobless rate remained in the range of 9.5 to 9.7 percent.

Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rate for adult men (9.8 percent), adult women (8.0 percent), teenagers (26.3 percent), whites (8.7 percent), blacks (16.3 percent), and Hispanics (12.0 percent) showed little change in August.

This earnings data is from the Current Population Survey program and is seasonally adjusted. For more information, see "The Employment Situation — August 2010," (HTML) (PDF), news release USDL-10-1212.