“Each month, The Hamilton Project examines the “jobs gap,” which is the number of jobs that the U.S. economy needs to create in order to return to pre-recession employment levels while also absorbing the people who enter the potential labor force each month. As of February 2017, our nation faces a jobs gap of 500,000 jobs. This chart shows how the jobs gap has evolved since the start of the Great Recession in December 2007, and how long it will take to close. The solid line shows the net number of jobs lost since the Great Recession began. The broken line tracks how long it will take to close the jobs gap if the economy adds about 196,000 jobs per month, which is the average monthly rate of net job creation over the last 12 months. With this projected job growth rate, the economy will reach pre-recession employment levels by June 2017.”

Learn more about the details on The Hamilton Project’s methodology for calculating the Jobs Gap.