2002 Employment Characteristics of Families — 2003-07-09

In 2002, 7.8 percent of families had an unemployed member, up from 6.6 per- cent the year before, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. This was the second consecutive increase in this proportion. Of the nation's 74.2 million families, 82.4 percent had at least one employed member in 2002, down by 0.4 percentage point from 2001. These data on employment, unemployment, and family relationships are collected as part of the Current Population Survey (CPS), a monthly sample survey of approximately 60,000 households. Families include married-couple families, as well as families maintained by a man or woman with no spouse present. For further information about the CPS, see the Technical Note. In an average week in 2002, 5.8 million families had at least one member who was unemployed, an increase of 962,000 families from 2001.