Unemployment As A Major Social Problem In The United States

Superior Essays
Ifeoma Uzo-Okoro.
M20871125.
Unemployment as a Major social Problem in the United States Unemployment is a major social issue in the United States and affects not just the individual involved but also the public. And this affects the society as a whole. The most recent recession which began in 2007 and ended in 2009 has put so many Americans out of job. According to Walker, the unemployment rate reported in Baltimore alone in May 2003 was 4.8 percent. And in the nation alone unemployment rate rose to 6.8 percent in the space of nine years. And according to Walter,Glymour and Avendano in their journal written in 2014, the health effects of US unemployment insurance policy, the rate of unemployment rose to 8.2%
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According to Lawrence H. Summers, in an article he wrote for the Concise Encyclopedia of Economics, there are people who consider unemployment not to be a big problem in the United States because people who are unemployed are very few in number when compared with the whole population and that most of them are below the age of twenty-four. People fail to see the problems it creates for the society. For instance, the decline in the wellbeing of individuals involved, which causes a lot of tension in the families, the financial hardship that these individuals and family suffer which can lead to a breakdown of family life and wellbeing, increased debt, homelessness, stress, alienation and shame, lack of any form of social life, boredom, bad parenting methods, have all been seen as a personal issue. But in a broader view, as previously discussed, we can see that the effects unemployment has on families can lead to divorce, the lives of the children involved will be in distress and these children are likely to be involved in violent behaviors, crime, do drugs, individuals become socially handicapped, frustrations and the feelings of inadequacy might linger even after these individuals return to work. Therefore, unemployment does not just affect the individuals who are directly involved but the society in which they live in as …show more content…
Firstly, the rapid change in technology has been known to affect the workforce. “There is great concern that emerging technologies such as computers, robotics, and artificial intelligence are displacing human jobs, creating an epidemic of technological unemployment” (Marchant, Stevens, and Hennessy, 2014). With this rise in technological advancement, less manpower is needed causing people to be displaced from their jobs. Another reason for unemployment is the recession. When a country is going through a recession, business and companies stop making money, and might have to cut down on labor costs. When this happens people are out in the job market. In addition, unemployment compensation is another major cause of unemployment because it can make the people receiving unemployment wages too lazy and comfortable that they stop searching for jobs. The money they get from unemployment benefits might fulfill their day to day needs, that way they stop looking for jobs (Lawrence, 2014). Among the mentioned causes of unemployment, racial discrimination, employee values, job dissatisfaction are also factors that can cause of unemployment in the United

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