I ran across a very interesting article at this address http://seekingalpha.com/article/313733-what-is-the-real-unemployment-rate?source=email_macro_view&ifp=0
The article makes the point that if the same number of people were looking for work today as in 2007 the unemployment rate would be 11%, not the official 8.6%. The unemployment rate has gone down because so many people have dropped out of the labor force.
Here’s a graph from the article 
I’ll add another chart from my August newsletter that shows the percentage of people working. 
Click on either chart to enlarge. The type in the charts is rather small.