Over the month, the employment-population ratio slipped to 59.9 percent, 2.8 percentage points lower than at the beginning of the recession and the lowest level since July 1985. Among the employed, the number of persons working part time who would prefer to be working full time increased by 423,000 over the month to 9.0 million. Since December 2007, this measure has risen by 4.4 million.
The emp-pop ratio peaked in 2000 at 64.7.