Long-term unemployment rose to 25.9% in 2026 as hiring and job openings fell, while layoffs stayed low and prime-age participation climbed.
The U.S. labor market is taking longer to absorb people who lose or leave work. During the first seven months of 2026, 25.9% of unemployed Americans had been without a job for at least 27 weeks, according to a MyPerfectResume analysis of 23 federal data sets. The share was 18.9% in 2023, and the number of people in this group grew from 1.1 million to 1.9 million.
For employers, the figures point to a market where fewer workers are being let go, yet job seekers face a thinner flow of new opportunities. That distinction matters: low layoffs can suggest stability, but they don't show how difficult it is for someone already searching to find a role. As MyPerfectResume career expert Dr. Jasmine Escalera put it, “More unemployed Americans are spending months looking for work at the same time employers are hiring at a slower pace.”
Job searches are lasting longer
The share of unemployed Americans classified as long-term unemployed has risen each year since 2023. By May 2026, nearly 2 million people had been out of work for at least 27 weeks. Across the first seven months of the year, the group averaged 1.9 million, up 68% from the 1.1 million recorded in 2023.
Duration measures reinforce the shift. The median time spent unemployed rose from 8.9 weeks in 2023 to 11.1 weeks in 2026. Average duration climbed from 20.4 weeks to 25.1 weeks. The median describes the midpoint of job seekers’ experiences, while the average can be pulled upward by people whose searches last much longer. Taken together, the measures indicate that longer searches are affecting more people and stretching further for some.
The 25.9% figure is a share of unemployed people, not of the entire U.S. workforce. It also covers the first seven months of 2026, while the May count is a single-month snapshot. Keeping those measures distinct helps show both the broader trend and the scale recorded in that month.
Fewer hires, fewer departures
Employer activity offers context for the longer searches. Between 2023 and 2026, the hiring rate fell from 3.8% to 3.3%, and the job openings rate declined from 5.8% to 4.4%. Both hiring and the rate at which workers quit reached their lowest points in the 11-year period examined. The quits rate dropped from 2.4% to 2.0%.
Layoffs, by contrast, remained at 1.1% over the comparison period and below their pre-pandemic rate. That combination describes a labor market with limited churn: employers are hiring less, workers are quitting less often, and layoffs haven't surged. The data show these patterns alongside longer unemployment spells, but they don't establish that the hiring slowdown caused those spells.
For a small business deciding whether to add staff, these figures provide broad context rather than a forecast for any one role or location. A lower openings rate and slower hiring point to fewer openings across the measured market. The report doesn't say how those conditions vary by industry, region, pay level or company size, so owners will need to assess the candidates and demand they see in their own markets.
Prime-age participation remains high
Adults ages 25 to 54 continued to participate actively in the labor market. In 2026, 83.7% of this group were working or looking for work, the highest rate in the study. That measure counts both people with jobs and people seeking them; it doesn't mean that all participants found work.
Unemployment rates were higher in several age and education groups than in 2019. For adults ages 25 to 34, the rate reached 4.7%, compared with 3.8% in 2019. Among adults ages 25 to 54, it was 3.7%, up from 3.1%. For those ages 20 to 24, the rate rose to 7.1% from 6.9%. Among people age 25 and older with at least a bachelor's degree, it was 2.8%, compared with 2.2%.
The largest increase among the age groups listed was among adults ages 25 to 34. The figures also show why participation and unemployment need to be read together: many prime-age adults remain in the labor force, while unemployment has increased in several groups.
What business owners can take from the data
The numbers don't tell employers which candidate to hire or how to set compensation. They do describe a useful tension for workforce planning: a sizable pool of people is seeking work for longer, while employers are posting fewer openings and making fewer hires. Owners recruiting for a position may want to pay close attention to the quality and range of applicants they encounter, while recognizing that these national figures can't predict the response to a particular job listing.
The next useful indicators to watch are whether hiring and openings begin to recover, whether average and median job-search durations ease, and whether the long-term unemployed population stops growing. For now, low layoffs alone don't capture the experience of the job market. The clearest takeaway is that finding a job is taking longer for more people even as prime-age participation remains strong.
The full MyPerfectResume long-term unemployment report provides the study details.
