bureau of labor statistics

You could just as well call them "Generation Why Bother." Amid our current hard times, the risk-averse and sedentary Gen Y-ers exhibit little of the gumption that helped prior generations survive their own periods of economic trouble.

International Women's Day honors women's successes, and also their struggles for equality. Nearly a century after American women won the universal right to vote, equal pay continues to remain a distant goal. Here are the metropolitan areas where the wage gap is the widest.

The economic turmoil that has left many Americans without work is having a disproportionate effect on teenage job-seekers, whose quest for entry-level positions often pits them against experienced older workers willing to take any job for a paycheck.

America's road to economic recovery has been long and slow -- and uneven. Some parts of the country are doing a lot worse than others. It's a pattern that shows up in the jobs numbers, poverty rates, foreclosures. But if you want a quick, simple gauge of how any part of the U.S. is doing economically, just look at its median household income.

With U.S. unemployment continuing to top 9%, just having a job is enough to make many of us feel grateful. But one job isn't always enough. The new order of the day: combining two jobs to make a livable salary. Do you have the drive it takes to be a successful moonlighter or 'moonpreneur'?

With unemployment high, wages stagnant and costs rising, a growing number of Americans are working a part time job -- or more than one -- to make ends meet. 24/7 Wall St. dug through the data to see which industries are the best bets for those seeking part-time work -- and some may surprise you.

Government measures show that inflation, at 1.6% in January, is still below the Fed's target of 2%. But commodity prices are soaring, and anyone who pays their household bills knows that food and energy prices are rising because of it. Is the Consumer Price Index getting it wrong?

It's no surprise that consumer prices are rising -- the prices of commodities from corn to cotton to copper are near record levels, thanks to shrinking supplies and rising demand worldwide. The question is whether the Fed will raise rates to combat this price inflation -- and whether it should.

Two sets of labor statistics data, released this week, point to a divergence between the job-openings rate and the total number of employees on nonfarm payrolls. And that divergence may well serve as a leading indicator for the labor market as a whole.

In January, job creation was anemic, yet unemployment plummeted. What gives? The answer lies in the quirky way the government decides who gets counted as part of the work force, who gets counted as officially unemployed and who gets left out of the picture.