Unemployment Hits 9.7 Percent

Jillian Bandes | September 04, 2009 9:03 AM

The only comparable time in recent history when unemployment was this high was in June 1983, when 10.1% of Americans were out of work. 216,00 jobs were lost in August of 2009.

Theoretically, it's not so bad, because 233,000 jobs were expected to be lost, and 276,000 were lost in July, so not only are we beating a worse outlook, but we're also not losing as many jobs as we were before. Whatever. 216,000 certainly doesn't make my heart sing.