Unemployment's Geographical Diversity

by Brian Wolfman

Here at the CLP Blog we worry about consumers, usually with regard to laws about consumer borrowing, unfair debt collection, disclosure of credit terms, arbitration, and the like. But nothing is more worrisome for U.S. consumers than our present-day persistent high unemployment -- particularly if you are in the nearly 10% who are officially unemployed (or among the many others who go uncounted because they have given up looking for work).

To put it mildly, unemployment is not evenly distributed across the country. This interactive map from the Washington Post shows official unemployment rates in every county in the U.S. The rates vary very widely by geography, more so that I had appreciated. In Michigan, a good number of counties have unemployment rates approaching or even above 20%. And some of them are nowhere near Detroit or Flint. Montmorency County, Michigan has an unemployment rate of 24.5% --- that is, a rate similar to what the country experienced at the depth of the Great Depression. On the other hand, in some parts of the rural midwest, unemployment rates are far lower. In some counties in Nebraska, for instance, unemployment rates are below 4%.

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