Unemployment spells hit 27.1 weeks, longest non-pandemic stretch since 2016

The average unemployed American spent 27.1 weeks looking for work in October, a figure flagged by Cointelegraph. That's the longest stretch outside the pandemic era since 2016. About 2 million people have now been jobless for six months or more.

An average that long doesn't happen because of a few unlucky cases. It happens when a big chunk of the unemployed keep missing, and their searches drag the midpoint out week after week.

The pandemic comparison is the one that stings. COVID-era layoffs produced record-long spells, so cutting that period out of the data leaves 2016 as the last time job hunts were this drawn out.

Six months is the line that separates a rough patch from a long-term problem. Once someone crosses it, the search usually gets harder, not easier, and two million people are sitting on the wrong side of that line right now.

Cointelegraph put the alert in front of its followers on X. For now, the numbers say what they say: finding the next job is taking longer than it has in nearly a decade, outside of the pandemic shock.