Discover America through socio-economic infographics produced by the U.S. Census Bureau: View Infographics Library.
Macro Economics and Jobs
Macroeconomic indicators represent key data points that reflect the overall health and performance of an economy, helping investors, policymakers, and businesses assess current conditions and make informed decisions.
Your and my income and retirement funds very much depend upon macro economics indicating stability and/or growth (in the right direction). Choosing to go in a new direction with your career should depend upon trends for job growth and earning potential.
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Employed Eligible Workers, aka Participation Rate: 62.4% 1BLS, U.S. Gov Bureau of Labor Statistics … The labor force participation rate represents the percentage of the civilian noninstitutional population aged 16 and over that is either working or actively looking for work. This information updated monthly.
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Unemployment Rate: 4.1% (Feb 2025) 2BLS, U.S. Gov Bureau of Labor Statistics This information updated monthly. Due to some employers being slow to report their numbers the rate can be adjusted within 1-2 months afterward, with change usually being less than 1/10th of 1%.
How Many Employed Math: It may seem illogical that the percentage of those employed and the percentage of those unemployed rarely is more than 70%. A simple explanation is that not everyone as of age of 16 and older have a job. Many are students (high school, college, technical school), stay-at-home parents, retirees, those institutionalized for whatever reason, pregnant mothers having left work, disabled and those ill or unable to currently work.
There are six ways of calculating unemployment. Reference to the unemployment rate is determined by the U-3 method of calculating total unemployment. An official unemployment rate number at national and state level is issued on the first Friday of each month by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). 3Visit this link for a discussion of how the six different unemployment rates are calculated.
BLS also calculates and publicly provides the unemployment rates for each state 4https://www.bls.gov/web/laus/laumstrk.htm and major metropolitan statistical areas (MSA). 5https://www.bls.gov/web/metro/laummtrk.htm
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GDP Growth: +2.3% (4Q 2024) 6BEA, U.S. Gov Bureau of Economic Analyses, U.S. Economy at a Glance | U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) The U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is a comprehensive measure of the nation’s economic activity. It represents the total monetary or market value of all the finished goods and services produced within a specific time period. This information is updated quarterly.
The most common method used to calculate GDP is the expenditure approach. This method sums up all spending on final, finished goods and services. The formula is: GDP = C + I + G + (NX):
- C (Consumption): Household spending on goods and services.
- I (Investment): Business spending on capital goods, inventory changes, and residential construction.
- G (Government Spending): Government expenditures on goods and services.
- NX (Net Exports): Exports minus imports.
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CPI aka Inflation Rate is determined by the U.S. Government Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the official tracker of CPI. 7BLS, Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI Tracker The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is a crucial economic indicator that measures changes in the price level of consumer goods and services purchased by households. There several ways to measure this. Since energy and food costs can surge and just as rapidly decrease then the CPI is tracked both with and without food and energy included costs. Common reference to the CPI is the calculation without food and energy included — this is the method used by BillGoldenJobs.
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Average / Median Income across USA … IMPORTANT: These numbers are FYI only. Actual average and median income can vary greatly from state to state and among localities within each state. Salary information at the average and median level are available down to a postal zip code. Local salary information is always more accurate and relevant than any region beyond the size of a metropolitan statistical area (MSA).
Average Salary is just that: all salaries earned within a specified geographic area are averaged.
Median Salary represents all salaries earned within a specific area are listed in order from highest to lowest. The salary number directly in the middle represents the median.
These numbers are useful for understanding how the general economy is performing. If both the average and the median are close to within 1-10% then the observed jobs marketplace could be considered very stable. A gross disparity of 10% or more could indicate a variety of things — there is no appropriate generalization to indicate why the two numbers are not similar.
Average and median salaries can also differ by age group, gender, ethnicity and skill type. For example, there could be new technologies at work replacing older processes and job definitions. Also, talent availability could be greater in some areas which could drive down the need for salaries to be competitive, and just the opposite could happen where some jobs outnumber qualified hires.
Sources for learning about your current market value:
View Point and Click Data or View Deep Dive Data for Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages from Bureau of Labor Statistics. Data for a quarterly count of employment and wages reported by employers covering more than 95 percent of U.S. jobs, available at the county, MSA, state and national levels by industry. Data are always a full quarter behind the present economic quarter we live within.
View Data from Bureau of Labor Statistics. An incredible amount of specific data available. Easy to use but not as simple to use as some public salary estimation services.
A custom-tweaked report of your market value is available from Salary.com; be aware that there are two versions: FREE and PAID. The paid version is much more accurate as you can tweak many different specifics as reflective of your skillset, education, certifications (technical or such things as security clearance level) … !! Try the free version first as it probably fits most people’s needs of having a general idea of their market value. Note: As an employer, I use the paid business version of Salary.com to gauge potential hire market value.
Other sources of salary information: … CareerOneStop … Indeed … ZipRecruiter.
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Questions, comments and your insight as to additional indicators are welcome: Bill Golden, WGolden@BillGoldenJobs.com