Oregon’s unemployment rate has been rising steadily for more than two years, rising to 5.0% on average A historic wave of layoffs among major employers and a general calm in the state’s labor market.

This slowdown extends to people who also have jobs, but are working less than they would like. These are people who work part-time jobs, those who prefer to work full-time, and others who have recently stopped looking for work.

This “underemployment” rate (economists classify it as the U-6 rate) began rising rapidly in Oregon last spring. It’s now at 9.3%, the highest level of underemployment in the state in four years.

Neither the standard unemployment rate, nor underemployment, is particularly high by historical standards.

Oregon’s U-6 rate exceeded 20% in 2009 and 2010, as the Great Recession swept through the state’s economy. It reached those levels briefly again in 2020, in the early days of the pandemic, and then quickly It fell to an all-time low 6.6% in 2023.

That was just two years ago, but Oregon’s job market was hotter then, when employers were struggling to find employees and workers had the freedom to choose jobs.

What is worrying now is how quickly unemployment and underemployment rates are rising, both of which have risen by percentages exceeding 10% on an annual basis in recent months.

Increasingly, Oregon’s labor market is diverging from the broader US economy. The state’s U-6 rate has risen twice as fast as the national increase since last spring, suggesting Oregon workers are more vulnerable to the weak economy.

This is The Oregonian’s weekly Oregon Insight look at the numbers behind the state’s economy. View past installments here.