Jobless Rate Drops to 5.3%, 14-Year Low : Boom in Summer Employment of Teens Credited

A boom in summertime work for teen-agers dropped the nation’s unemployment rate in June to a 14-year low of 5.3%, the government said today.

Seasonally adjusted employment last month jumped 820,000--75% of it among young people 16 to 24 years old--to more than offset May’s decline of 536,000.

The 0.3-percentage-point improvement in the unemployment rate marked the first time the rate has dipped so strongly since 1986 and sent it to its lowest since joblessness stood at 5.1% in May, 1974.

Unemployment among teen-agers fell 2 percentage points to 13.6%, its lowest since 1970.

Among black teens, the rate fell a whopping 6% to 28.4%, the lowest recorded since that statistic was first tracked in 1972. Black teen-age employment, however, was still more than double the 12% rate for white teens.

Foreign Tourists

Analysts had anticipated a surge in youth employment in the tourism industry as unprecedented numbers of foreigners, buoyed by the devalued dollar, are vacationing in the United States this summer.

President Reagan appeared before reporters at his spokesman’s daily press session to applaud the labor force report and to do some thinly veiled stumping for Vice President George Bush.

“Today’s news is more solid evidence that the policies of this Administration work, that our philosophy works,” Reagan said. “I predict that 1988 will be a banner year for Republicans because it’s a banner year for peace and prosperity in America.

“More Americans are working today than ever before in our history,” he said. “As they sit around their kitchen tables, more Americans are planning for their future, not desperately searching the want ads for a job.”

The Labor Department said the June job growth was affected in part by the fact that its monthly household survey was conducted late in the month, “allowing extra time for students, graduates and seasonal workers to find jobs.”

345,000 Jobs Created

The hiring boom meant that 62.3% of working-age Americans had jobs.

A separate survey of business payrolls showed that 345,000 jobs were created in June, contrasted with an average of 250,000 a month from February through May. The largest increases were in services and retail trade, 160,000 and 75,000 respectively.

The Labor Department said there were also “noteworthy” gains of 25,000 jobs each in transportation and wholesale trade, reflecting increased factory output.

The active housing market sent employment in the finance, insurance and real estate industries up by a total of 15,000, contrasted with a gain of only 1,000 in May.

Meanwhile, the number of so-called “discouraged workers”--out-of-work people who have given up the search for jobs in the belief that none exist--declined 117,000 to 910,000 in the April-June quarter.

The number of people working part time because they could not find full-time jobs jumped 470,000 in June to 5.3 million, however.