Let's Talk Unemployment

My stats on long term unemployment were questioned several times about whether they were standardized and thus I thought this would be a good time to address the issue of standardized unemployment rates.

Yes, different countries do measure their unemployment rates differently. This results in incomparable data and is why Japan has always had what was considered an absurdly low unemployment rate. However, institutions such as the BLS, OECD and ILO do standardize the rates, allowing us to compare them against one another.

On March 28th, the OECD came out with their OECD Factbook 2006, thus putting me in a quandry;

Do I hold true to my economic principles and promptly cancel my date with the impossibly gorgeous blond or

Go out with the blond knowing I have betrayed the Sacred Economic Order.

Regardless, in the Factbook they had standardized rates which would prove useful;

What was also interesting was that they broke down the unemployment rates for men and women. I thus subtracted the female unemployment rate from the male unemployment rate to see where the men were pulling more of their own weight.

It seems Greece and other central European countries have more of their men working than women. Ireland has more of their women working than their men. Alas, it seems this is more of a measure of which countries keep their women at home and not necessarily a reflection upon a stronger male work ethic...it is also futher proof I want a Irish girl.