Fewer Americans Working Today Than Before The Recession Began

While there are more people working in the United States today than when the recession began, the number of native born Americans working today is still lower than it was when the recession began.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, beofre the recession, the number of people with jobs peaked at 146.2 million in September 2007. Today, 147.3 million people have jobs.

But the job growth has not been even. Foreign born immigrants have fared far better than American citizens.

The number of native born citizens with jobs peaked at 124 million in November 2007, and fell to a low of 115.7 million in January 2010, before rising to 122.6 million today. So while the number of native born citizens with jobs has risen by almost 7 million, there are still 1.4 million fewer native born Americans with jobs today than when the recession began. 

Over this same time, the native born population above the age of 16 has grown from 197.7 million in November 2007 to 208.8 million today.

Immigrants, however, have fared far better during the Obama recovery. Before the recession, the number of foreign born workers peaked at 23.3 million in July 2007, before falling to 21.1 million in January 2010. Today, however, the number of foreign born workers with jobs has risen to 25.1 million, a gain of 4 million jobs since the bottom of the recession, and a gain of 1.8 million jobs since the recession began.