Employment Rate In America, the unemployment rate is a measure of the number of people actively engaged in searching for a job expressed as a percentage of the labor force. Five years ago, the unemployment rate was very high, and it had hit the 10% mark. However, as the years passed, the unemployment rate kept falling, to currently below the 6% mark. In the current year, the unemployment rate has declined significantly, from 5.9% in the month of September to 5.8% in the month of October.