Unemployment Up 1 Percent, Freaking Out Up 16 Percent

Katherine Mangu-Ward | October 29, 2008

According to Pew Research Center, 64 percent of Americans say that it is tough to find a job where they live—up from 48 percent in November 2007.

 In fact, the unemployment rate has increased just a little over 1 percent since November 2007. Interestingly, the unemployment rate is virtually identical to where it was in October 2003, the previous high point in oh-my-god-I-can't-get-a-jobism. The perception about the difficultly of finding a job does track actual unemployment, it simply fluctuates insanely out of proportion to the reality. See a chart of unemployment rates below.

And then there's this:

While the perception that jobs are difficult to find has increased among people across the political spectrum, Democrats (70%) and independents (67%) are more likely to say so than are Republicans (53%).