We need to talk about a deep, structural problem hiding in plain sight in the US labor market, which reflects a broader global problem: fewer than half of American adults have full-time jobs, and 40% don’t work at all.

Despite official unemployment figures standing at 3.8% or 6.4 million Americans, the actual scope of unemployment is much broader – potentially encompassing 80 million Americans or up to 45% of the potential workforce. This wider demographic includes long-term job seekers (those searching for over 27 weeks), individuals who have ceased actively looking for employment, and those who remain jobless due to the lack of opportunities.

This is true despite low official unemployment rates and rosy monthly reports from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Many tens of millions of jobless Americans are left out of official unemployment numbers, while many millions who are working part-time, as little as an hour a week, are counted as officially “employed.”

In the aggregate American adults work little more than half time (i.e. about 55% of the person-hours in the potential workforce, based on a 40-hour week). That represents a tragic loss of the potential contributions of millions to the economy, which exacts huge, tangible costs to individuals, families, communities, business, and government.

While some don’t work or work less than full time by choice or due to physical limitations, many tens of millions have no choice due to a lack of job opportunity. But they would likely choose to work, or work more hours, if jobs were available to them.

For example, two-thirds of seniors want jobs but don’t have them. To extend opportunity to all seniors who want to work, we’d need to create about 22 million more jobs.

Most people with disabilities want jobs, but just to employ them at the same rate as the general population, we’d need to create over 25 million more jobs.

Taking into account unmet need and demand for work among other chronically underemployed groups — youth, women, people of color, legal immigrants, and others — the official number of unemployed (roughly 7 million) is probably less than 10% of the real need for jobs.