Multimedia: Charts

Evolution of the “Job Gap” and Possible Scenarios for Growth

February 3, 2012

Each month, The Hamilton Project examines the “job gap,” which is the number of jobs that the U.S. economy needs to create in order to return to pre-recession employment levels while absorbing the 125,000 people who enter the labor force each month. The January “job gap” is estimated at 11.7 million jobs. This chart shows how the jobs gap has evolved since December 2007 and shows three different scenarios for different rates of job growth.  If the economy adds about 208,000 jobs per month, which was the average monthly rate for the best year of job creation in the 2000s, then it will take until November 2023—11 years and 9 months—to close the jobs gap. Given a more optimistic rate of 321,000 jobs per month, which was the average monthly rate for the best year of job creation in the 1990s, the economy will reach pre-recession employment levels by January 2017—not for another five years.