當地時間5月9日，《紐約時報》用整個頭版的版面，等比例展示了美國近年來的失業率變化情況，圖示顯示，今年4月美國失業人數“飛流直下三千尺”，整個豎版差點快放不下……
“失業有多嚴重？看看這個圖表吧！” 《紐約時報》在報道中提到，4月以來美國經濟進一步陷入危機，失業人數達2050萬，失業率飆升至14.7％，創大蕭條以來最高值。
The American economy plunged deeper into crisis last month, losing 20.5 million jobs as the unemployment rate jumped to 14.7 percent, the worst devastation since the Great Depression.
這些數據來自美國勞工部7日發佈的月度報告，《紐約時報》表示，報告清晰展示了疫情期間美國經濟損失的廣度和深度，以及蔓延的速度。
幾乎從任何角度來看，這都是一份慘淡的報告。有工作的成年人比例為51.3%，是有記錄以來最低的；據報道，有近1100萬人因為找不到全職工作，而被迫在做兼職工作，在疫情爆發前這一數字約為400萬。
From almost any vantage point, it was a bleak report. The share of the adult population with a job, at 51.3 percent, was the lowest on record. Nearly 11 million people reported working part time because they couldn’t find full-time work, up from about four million before the pandemic.
文章稱，失業已經影響到整個經濟，影響到每個主要行業。4月份，休閒和酒店等行業首當其衝，連醫療保健行業也減少了100多萬個工作崗位。低收入羣體受到的打擊尤其嚴重，包括許多婦女和少數民族。
Job losses have encompassed the entire economy, affecting every major industry. Areas like leisure and hospitality had the biggest losses in April, but even health care shed more than a million jobs. Low-wage workers, including many women and members of racial and ethnic minorities, have been hit especially hard.
美國銀行首席美國經濟學家米歇爾·邁耶直呼 “這簡直是破紀錄” ，“在經濟衰退中，通常需要幾個月或幾個季度的時間才能顯現出來的事情，這次在幾周內就發生了。”
“It’s literally off the charts,” said Michelle Meyer, head of U.S. economics at Bank of America. “What would typically take months or quarters to play out in a recession happened in a matter of weeks this time.”
“我原以為大衰退是一輩子才會發生一次，但這次更糟。” 標準普爾評級公司首席經濟學家貝絲·安·波維諾表示。
“I thought the Great Recession was once in a lifetime, but this is much worse,” said Beth Ann Bovino, chief U.S. economist at S&P Global.
《紐約時報》還提到了報告中的一個“亮點”，近80%的失業者表示，他們是被暫時解僱，預計將在未來幾個月重返工作崗位。
The one bright spot in Friday’s report was that nearly 80 percent of the unemployed said they had been temporarily laid off and expected to return to their jobs in the coming months.
上週五早上，特朗普總統在接受福克斯新聞採訪時支持了這一觀點。“這些工作崗位都會回來、很快就會回來，” 特朗普説，“明年我們將迎來非凡的一年。”
President Trump endorsed this view in an interview Friday morning on Fox News. “Those jobs will all be back, and they’ll be back very soon,” Mr. Trump said, “and next year we’re going to have a phenomenal year.”
但均富會計師事務所首席經濟學家黛安·斯旺克表示，這種樂觀是錯誤的，許多工作崗位是無法恢復的。
But Diane Swonk, chief economist at Grant Thornton, said that such optimism was misplaced, and that many of the jobs could not be recovered.
“這將是一個艱難的現實，”斯旺克説，“這些‘休假’是永久性的，不是暫時性的。”
“This is going to be a hard reality,” Ms. Swonk said. “These furloughs are permanent, not temporary.”
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