More Unemployed Drop Out Of Labor Force Than Get New Job

From The New York Times, Economix, "How One Month’s Jobless Fare a Month Later" by Catherine Rampell:

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics, via Haver Analytics. The lines show worker flows from unemployment last month into each of the following statuses in the current month: unemployment, not in labor force, employment.
Source: The New York Times

As you can see [from chart above], the most likely outcome for someone unemployed in May was to continue being unemployed in June. The second-most-likely outcome was to drop out of the labor force entirely — that is, stop looking for work. (That’s part of the reason that today’s labor force participation rate is so low, although the biggest flow into the “not in labor force” category still comes from people who are leaving jobs rather than giving up a fruitless job hunt.)

Finally, the third-most-likely outcome was to find a job. Over all, fewer than one in five people who were unemployed in May were employed in June.

Unemployed workers have been more likely to flow out of the labor force than into employment for almost the entire period beginning around December 2008 to the present.