The national unemployment rate for January was 8.1% This means that nationwide 8.1% of employable individuals have reported that they are out of work by filing for unemployment.

Interestingly a whopping 45.3% of Salary.com newsletter readers who took this survey said they had been laid off in the last six months, and 7.2% said they have been unemployed for more than 6 months. This is considerably higher than the official national average and you should keep in mind when viewing the rest of the survey that these results only apply to our readership and may or may not be an indication of the national situation.