Final answer:
The correct statement about structural unemployment is that it can be positive or negative, depending on the economic conditions. Structural unemployment always has a positive value, reflecting the mismatch between skills available in the labor force and skills in demand, and it is always part of the natural rate of unemployment.
Step-by-step explanation:
The correct statement about structural unemployment is b. It can be positive or negative, depending on the economic conditions.
Structural unemployment occurs when individuals lack the skills valued by the labor market. This can happen when demand shifts away from their skills or when they never learned any skills in the first place. For example, unemployment among aerospace engineers after the downsizing of the U.S. space program in the 1970s is an example of the former. On the other hand, high school dropouts who lack the necessary skills for many jobs represent an example of the latter.
Structural unemployment always has a positive value, reflecting the mismatch between skills available in the labor force and skills in demand, and it is always part of the natural rate of unemployment.
The correct statement about structural unemployment is that it is always a positive number. Structural unemployment refers to a situation where there is a mismatch between the skills that workers in the labor market have and the skills that are in demand. This type of unemployment can arise from technological changes, such as when machines replace skilled workers, or when there's a geographic shift in employment opportunities. Structural unemployment does not fall to zero because it is influenced by the natural rate of unemployment, which accounts for frictional and structural unemployment combined.