The information presented here on unemployment among degree holders in the humanities and other major academic fields is based on an original analysis by the Humanities Indicators of data from the American Community Survey (ACS), which has been administered by the U.S. Census Bureau since 2005. The ACS replaced the “long form” version of the decennial census and collects information—used to allocate more than $400 billion in state and federal funding—about Americans’ personal characteristics, family composition, employment, income, and housing.

The ACS-based unemployment estimates presented here diverge from the better-known monthly unemployment figures based on the Current Population Survey, which is jointly sponsored by BLS and the Census Bureau, “because the surveys use different questions, samples, and collection methods.” (For additional information, see the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ “American Community Survey Questions and Answers” at http://www.bls.gov/lau/acsqa.htm).

For additional information on the occupations of those who studied the humanities in college, see “Occupations of Humanities Majors with a Terminal Bachelor’s Degree,” “Occupations of College Humanities Majors Who Earned an Advanced Degree,” and “Gender and the Occupations of Humanities Majors.”

For additional information on the earnings of those who studied the humanities in college, see “Earnings of Humanities Majors with a Terminal Bachelor’s Degree,” “Earnings of Humanities Majors with an Advanced Degree,” “Job Satisfaction of Humanities Majors,” and “Effect of Experience on the Earnings of Humanities Degree Recipients.”

For historical trends in the number of students who have earned degrees in the humanities, see “Bachelor’s Degrees in the Humanities” and “Advanced Degrees in the Humanities.”