Justin Wolfers
Professor of economics and public policy at the University of Michigan, a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, and author of a widely used i...
“Some people say, oh, well, most people are fine with unemployment because only 4% of people are unemployed. That's true. But at the microeconomic level, there's always people entering and always people exiting. And by the end of the year, many, many, many more than 4% of the population will have experienced some degree of unemployment.”
Platypus Economics with Justin Wolfers · Money & Markets · October 2026
Context
Wolfers was explaining why averages hide what happens in individual lives, the difference between microeconomics and macroeconomics. He applies the same logic to the unemployment rate.
Transcript
So for instance, the unemployment rate right now is at 4.1%, 4.2%. Let's call it 4.
I think it's 4%. Yeah.
Some people say, oh, well, unemployment, most people are fine with unemployment because only 4% of people are unemployed. That's true. But at the microeconomic level, there's always people entering and always people exiting. And by the end of the year, many, many, many more than 4% of the population will have experienced some degree of unemployment.
So what's happening on average
is very different than what's happening at the microeconomic, that is the individual lives level. Okay. What are we going to get to next, mate?
Well, I guess. Before we get into our next segment, we should talk about how this might potentially play out in the election. Like, what do you think is going to move the needle here? I mean, you're in a battleground state. You're in a deeply purple state.
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