The monthly labor-market conveyor

A particle view of U.S. transitions among employment, unemployment, and nonparticipation. Press play: a dot changes to its destination color, then takes a short curved flight to its new bin.

EmployedUnemployedNot in labor forceOutside 16+ population
December 2018starting composition
Employed–people, seasonally adjusted
Unemployed–people, seasonally adjusted
Not in labor force–people, seasonally adjusted
Dec 2022 · start

How to read it. One dot represents 100,000 people. The dot count is therefore about 2,650, and it changes only at the top and bottom edges. Each bin uses stable grid slots: departures free a slot and arrivals take an empty one. The large labels use the published national totals; moving-dot counts are rounded to the nearest 100,000 people.

Data. BLS Current Population Survey research series, seasonally adjusted, January 2019–July 2026, with December 2018 as the starting composition. White dots are BLS marginal inflows and outflows: entries to, and exits from, the civilian population age 16 and over. They include ageing into scope, estimated deaths, and population-control adjustments; they do not identify individual births, deaths, or migration. Method and data · latest BLS table.

Note: This prototype was "vibe-coded" using OpenAI Codex with ChatGPT 5.6 Terra.