In a recent Heritage in Focus, Heritage expert James Sherk discusses the recent unemployment report. Listen to the full podcast, here.

The recent jobs report released was extraordinary. For the first time in its history, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) found that the average length of unemployment was nearly 40 weeks – the longest average ever.

Layoffs don’t account for such high unemployment, however. Believe it or not, our economy lost more jobs during the 2001 recession than we did during the 2008 recession.

So what’s driving high unemployment?

The lack of job creation.

In a recent Congressional testimony, businesses protested crippling regulations. Tom Nasiff, president and CEO of the Western Growers Association, said:

With a regulatory environment that is stifling job creation and economic opportunity, the majority of us must rely on off-farm income to support our families,” Nassif said, “an increasing number of us are moving our production off-shore, and some of us are simply shutting down our operations.

Listen to Heritage labor economist James Sherk add his analysis, here.

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