Key Takeaways

Long-term unemployment has climbed to 25.7% as of August 2025, the highest in over three years, signaling tougher conditions for job seekers.
Extended unemployment strains people’s savings, while also making it harder to reenter the labor force due to skill erosion and employer bias.
Experts recommend networking, skill-building, and trying out contract work as strategies for landing a new role.

The number of people considered long-term unemployed—or unemployed for 27 weeks or more—has ticked up this year, signaling a more competitive labor market for job hunters.

As of August 2025, the percentage of long-term unemployed was 25.7%, the highest it has been since February 2022.

What Long-Term Unemployment Really Means—and Why It’s a Big Deal

Economists use long-term unemployment as one of many indicators they look at to determine the health of the labor market.

When long-term unemployment goes up, it signals that some job seekers are finding it harder to get back into the labor force, according to Josh Hirt, a senior U.S. economist at Vanguard.

“We’re in this environment [that] I think has been aptly characterized as a low-hire, low-fire type of environment. So things are a bit more at a standstill,” Hirt said.

Long-term unemployment can be more challenging on people’s finances compared to those who are unemployed for shorter periods of time, as unemployment benefits in many states only last up to 26 weeks.

Plus, those who are unemployed for a long time may forgo health insurance if they previously received it through an employer.

“As you become unemployed for longer and longer, it’s going to wear much heavier on whatever savings you might have,” said Cory Stahle, a senior economist at Indeed.

Additionally, those who deal with long-term unemployment may face poorer job prospects in the future.

Research analyzing those who were unemployed after the Great Recession found that of those who were long-term unemployed in a given month, nearly one-third (30%) were still unemployed and looking for work 15 months later.

“Thus, if there is a structural problem currently confronting the long-term unemployed that pushes them to the margins of the labor market, it presumably has come about because their skills, motivation to find a job, or self-esteem eroded during their long stretch of unemployment, or because employers treat the long-term unemployed differently,” the researchers wrote.

In other words, the long-term unemployed may face a variety of obstacles making it harder to land a new role, like being less motivated to job hunt and discrimination from employers.

How To Find a Job When You’ve Been Unemployed For a Long Stretch Of Time

Michelle Reisdorf, a district director at Robert Half, a recruitment firm, emphasized the importance of going outside of your comfort zone, especially if the traditional way of applying to jobs online hasn’t worked.

“Oftentimes that comes with networking, connecting with people that you don’t know, attending events that you’ve never attended before, maybe signing up for classes or courses to brush up on your skills,” Reisdorf said.

She also recommended being open to part-time or contract work, which also can help ease the burden of unemployment on your finances.

“It [contract work] many times gets your foot in the door when you need to get back into the workforce and/or there’s a specific company that you’re targeting,” Reisdorf said.

Most importantly, Stahle said to be kind to yourself during this period, as it may be emotionally and mentally taxing to continually apply to jobs, interview, and be rejected.

“Remember that careers are not built over the course of a six-month or one-year period, but rather over the course of, preferably, decades,” Stahle said.