February 01, 2012
People who report on Germany’s economy should know that the unemployment rate reported by the government is not calculated the same way as the U.S. unemployment rate. It includes people who are working part-time but would like full-time jobs as being unemployed. This means that the rate reported by the government is not directly comparable to the U.S. rate. This means that the NYT misled readers when it told them that Germany’s unemployment rate fell to 6.7 percent in January.
However, the OECD does publish unemployment rates for Germany that are calculated in a similar manner to the U.S. unemployment rate. By this measure, Germany’s unemployment rate was 5.5 percent in November. Assuming that the OECD rate followed the same path as the German government rate, German’s unemployment rate would be 5.3-5.4 percent today if calculated on a comparable basis to the U.S. rate.
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