Unemployment among Latinos remained the same between October and November, while for the general U.S. population it fell to a two-year low, according to the Labor Department.
The Latino jobless rate held at 11.4 percent in November, the same it was in October. The national unemployment rate, however, dropped 0.4 percentage points to 8.6 -- from 9 percent the previous month -- the lowest it's been since March, 2009, during the depths of the recession.
The decline occurred as employers stepped up hiring in response to the slowly improving economy.
For Latinos, the latest unemployment rate was higher than it was during the summer, when it was 11.3 percent, but lower than what is was a year ago, when it was 12.7 percent.
The picture was more bleak for the general population of teenagers, who have an unemployment rate of 23.7 percent. For Latino teenagers, it was significantly higher -- 31.8 percent.
Despite the unemployment decline for the overall U.S. population, the fact remains that 13.3 million Americans remain unemployed. And a key reason the unemployment rate fell so much was because roughly 315,000 people had given up looking for work and were no longer counted as unemployed.
The presidential election is less than a year away, which means President Barack Obama will almost certainly face voters with the highest unemployment rate of any president since World War II. Rival Republicans have made the nation's joblessness a key campaign issue.
In July, Republicans launched an anti-Obama media campaign aimed at Latinos in the Southwest. READ MORE
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