unemployment
Americannoun
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the state of being unemployed, especially involuntarily.
Automation poses a threat of unemployment for many unskilled workers.
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the number of persons who are unemployed.
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Informal. unemployment benefit.
noun
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the condition of being unemployed
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the number of unemployed workers, often as a percentage of the total labour force
Usage
What does unemployment mean? Unemployment is the state of not having a paid job—of being unemployed. Unemployment is also commonly used in the context of economics to mean the total number of people unemployed, such as in a country, as in Unemployment is down this quarter, with thousands of new jobs having been created. The opposite of this is employment—the total number of people who are employed. Employment also commonly means the state of being employed. The word unemployment is sometimes used as a short and informal way of referring to an unemployment benefit, which is an allowance of money paid to unemployed workers, such as by the government. People receiving such a benefit are often said to be receiving unemployment. Example: Unemployment is extremely stressful when you go months without any job prospects.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of unemployment
First recorded in 1885–90; un- 1 + employment
Explanation
Unemployment refers to not having a job. The more people have work, the less unemployment there is. When you're employed by someone, you work for them: employment is a job. Therefore, unemployment is the lack of a job. Economists often talk about how much unemployment there is and whether the unemployment rate is increasing or decreasing. If it's up, that's bad for the economy, because more people are out of work. Sometimes, the government provides unemployment benefits for people who have recently lost their jobs.
Vocabulary lists containing unemployment
Eastern Europe - Introductory
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Western Europe - Introductory
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The Great Depression and The New Deal
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Alphabet raises $80 billion, index funds bend their rules for AI, and Spain’s unemployment rate is way down.
From Slate • Jun. 6, 2026
But proponents of this theory point out that faster hiring should be pushing down the unemployment rate—that is, unless labor supply were rising, too.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 6, 2026
But at the same time, the average length of unemployment climbed to 26 weeks, up from 24.4 weeks in April.
From MarketWatch • Jun. 5, 2026
But it gave the BLS credit for taking steps to help mitigate this risk by developing an online response method for the household survey, which informs the unemployment rate.
From Barron's • Jun. 5, 2026
It wasn’t by choice, and he wasn’t alone: massive unemployment in Italy had pushed many Italians to emigrate.
From "The Mona Lisa Vanishes" by Nicholas Day
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
