The Bureau of Labor Statistics has released its monthly report on employment and unemployment in the United States. Overall, the May data shows little sign that the economy is improving. The prospects for the long-term unemployed remain poor.

By the numbers:

• Nominal unemployment rate: 8.2 percent
• Number of unemployed Americans: 12,720,000
• Average weeks unemployed: 39.7
• Number of Americans unemployed over 27 weeks: 5,411,000
• Workers discouraged and not looking: 830,000

And, here are the current unemployment rates by sex, ethnicity and education:

• Men over age 20: 7.8 percent
• Women over age 20: 7.4 percent
• Whites: 7.4 percent
• Blacks: 13.6 percent
• Hispanic / Latino: 11.0 percent
• No high school diploma: 13.0 percent
• High school diploma only: 8.1 percent
• 4 yr degree of higher: 3.9 percent

The Bureau of Labor Statistics has a great deal to say about the November 2011 unemployment numbers and the October numbers from the metro areas. The unemployment rate fell to 8.6 percent from 9 percent in November. In October, the unemployment rates fell in 281 of the 372 metro areas the BLS watches.

The pictures tell a far more discouraging tale. These graphs are from the BLS site, using their data. None of the graphs present any sort of encouraging picture for those who are unemployed or those who have given up. And, lots of folks have just given up.

Graph of the percentage of Americans employed compared to the general population for November 2011

Graph of the percentage of Americans who could work that had a job in November 2011

Graph of the average weeks of unemployment for Americans in November 2011

Graph of the number of Americans unemployed over 27 weeks for November 2011

Graph of the number of Americans discouraged from looking for work for November 2011

The graphs were built to show both the current record or near record “bad” numbers as well as their opposites from the Clinton and Bush Administrations. Fewer people are working and more people have dropped out of the labor force. That is the tale of November 2011.

The slideshow illustrates the unemployment data for each July for the last decade, 2002 to 2011.

Bureau of labor Statistics graph of black unemployment rates 1982-2011

The Bureau of Labor Statistics has kept data on unemployment among American blacks since 1972. The record high rate of unemployment was in June 1983, 20.7%. The record low was in April 2000 at 7%. For June 2011 the black unemployment rate is 16.2%.

The last thirty years have seen four peaks for black unemployment and three troughs.

The highest rate of black unemployment in the Obama era was 16.5% in March and April 2010. It has now been fourteen months since that peak. Black unemployment has dropped to 16.2%.

In comparison, after the first peak in the table, black unemployment had dropped from 20.7% to 16% in fourteen months. After the second peak it went from 14.7% to 12.7%. The fourteen months after the third peak saw black unemployment go from 11.5% to 10.5%.

The last Census report on poverty in America was released in September 2010 for the year 2009. Black poverty was up from its record low rate in 2000 of 22.5%. In 2009 just over one in four American blacks lived in poverty. For blacks living in a household headed by a woman, 40% lived in poverty.

Over the last generation, reductions in black unemployment have become increasingly more difficult to achieve. Even the record low rate set in 2000 was the highest of any minority and came during the one of the greatest economic upturns since World War Two. In the midst of an economic boom, seven percent of blacks remained unemployed.

Black unemployment, like black poverty, contains a core group that may not be reachable by economics and the free market as we know it. This hardcore cluster of poor blacks was created by social dynamics and governmental policies that may have created a permanently disenfranchised class lacking the ability to change their own condition.

The White House and its allies have been touting the claims contained in the Council of Economic Advisers’ latest quarterly report that

the Recovery Act is already responsible for 2.5 to 3.6 million – or about 3 million – jobs

The table above was created using the data from the U.S. Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics. These are the government’s own numbers, used by their agencies and a wide variety of private businesses for planning and decision making.

The number of Americans employed has decreased by over 3.1 million since the Obama administration took office. True unemployment, the total unemployed and the total discouraged from looking for work, has increased over the same time frame by nearly 3.2 million Americans.

U.S. employment levels, 2009-2010, BLS data. Click for a larger image.

Numbers of Americans unemployed 2009-2010, BLS data. Click for a larger image

True unemployment includes those unemployed and looking for work and those no longer looking, the discouraged. The true unemployment rate on January 31, 2009 was 8.9%. As of June 30, 2010 it was 11.38%.

Americans no longer looking for work 2009-2010, discouraged, BLS data. click for a larger image.

When the Obama Administration took office, 65.7% of the population participated in the work force. That rate is now 64.7%. In January 2009, 60.6% of the population was working and that rate is now 58.5%.

U.S. civilian labor force participation 2009-2010, BLS graph. Click for a larger image.

U.S. employment to population ratio, BLS. graph. Click for a larger image.

For the White House claims to be correct, either the BLS data is wrong, or the Recovery Act prevented unemployment from reaching a level of 6 million Americans. The data clearly demonstrates that about 3 million fewer Americans are no longer working.