A key labor-market ratio has tumbled near record lows — and Deutsche Bank's top economist says the US has to create a whopping 30 million jobs to reach a new all-time high

• In April, the employment-to-population ratio — the percentage of those above 16 who currently have a job — fell to an all-time low of 51.3%. That means only half of working-age Americans are currently employed.
• "To get the employment-to-population ratio back to where it was at its peak in 2000 we need to create 30 million jobs," Torsten Slok, chief economist at Deutsche Bank, wrote in a Monday note.
• The US economy added 2.5 million jobs in May, and economists expect Thursday's jobs report to show it added another 3 million in June. That's still a long way off from recovering the 20.5 million jobs lost in April.

The coronavirus pandemic devastated the US labor market, pushing unemployment up to highs not seen since the Great Depression by putting millions of Americans out of work.

In April, the employment-to-population ratio — the percentage of those above age 16 who currently have a job — fell to an all-time low of 51.3%. In May, it ticked up slightly, but was still 52.8%, meaning that only half of working-age Americans currently have a job.

Even as the US economy reopens and people go back to work, there's a long road ahead for the recovery, according to Torsten Slok, chief economist at Deutsche Bank.

"To get the employment-to-population ratio back to where it was at its peak in 2000 we need to create 30 million jobs," Slok wrote in a Monday note. Slok said that in February there were 6 million unemployed people in the US — today, there are 21 million.

Before the coronavirus pandemic, the employment-to-population ratio was steadily gaining toward the all-time high of 64.7% in April 2000. In January, before the coronavirus pandemic hit the US, the key ratio was 61.2%.

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Even at the current rate that the US economy is adding back jobs, it will take some time to return to the 2000 high. In April, US employers shed more than 20 million payrolls in the worst month so far of coronavirus-pandemic job losses. The unemployment rate hit 14.7% that month, the highest since the Great Depression.

In May, the labor market rebounded, adding 2.5 million jobs and sending the unemployment rate to 13.3%. On Thursday, the Labor Department will report the June nonfarm payrolls numbers, which economists expect will show the US economy added 3 million jobs in the month, reflecting an unemployment rate around 12%.

If the report is in line with expectations, it will be a positive sign that recovery is underway in the US. Still, there will be a roughly 15-million job hole from the coronavirus pandemic that will need to be filled just to return to pre-pandemic levels. To see growth in the employment-to-population ratio, the US will have to add even more jobs.