The scale of the underemployment is certainly newsworthy; for example, here in the NYC metro area we have lost thousands of financial sector jobs to India and the Philippines that frankly will never come back. People who thought they had careers in those fields are fleeing the high costs of the area (which were only tolerable because of decent pay before); the number of foreclosures is climbing as the backlog has been cleared and people are again having their homes sold by the banks holding their mortgages. I know 2 computer programmers who were looking for work as cab drivers and security for supermarkets; this is what we’ve been reduced to.
“Underemployment” is necessary to recognize the financial disaster being visited on a huge number of American families.