If you've ever been without a job or steady income, you know firsthand how not having a job or enough money to cover your bills can affect your day-to-day existance.
With Ohio's unemployment rate going up just weeks before a presidential election, it's drawing renewed political notice.
On Friday one union group was among the first to use the new state unemployment statistics to throw a punch.
A union group called "Working America" held a news conference to show off a new website where visitors can check which companies are outsourcing -- or exporting -- jobs.
A laid-off Cincinnati AT&T worker says he's been without a job since December.
"I'm sitting here with a masters' degree and 21 years of accumulated skills," said Keith Adams, "from running a business -- a union local and I'm still unemployed. I am still not employable."
Adams has more company now.
The latest figures from this August show Ohio unemployment increased to 6.3-percent, even as the national unemployment rate has reportedly dropped.
Adams says his AT&T job was among almost 2,000 that were outsourced from Cincinnati.
"These were jobs that are high skilled and highly educated," said Adams. "They're the kind of jobs my mom and dad, and my grandparents, all told me to go to college for 'cause, 'you'll be all right when you get one of those kinds of jobs.' Not any more!"
County unemployment figures for Ohio show unemployment varying widely just in the Tri-state -- from just 4-percent in Butler and Warren County, to almost 6-percent and 7-percent in Brown and Highland counties.
The "Working America" group supports Senator Kerry because he's campaigning to stop outsourcing.
But Bush supporters say while the overall economy is improving, that president claims he has plans to lower unemployment where it's high.
"That's one reason why the President has proposed a new policy called 'opportunity zones,' so areas where job creation hasn't been as strong as it needs to be, will get tax breaks and incentives so they can compete with every area of the world," said Marc Summerlin, a former Bush economic advisor.
With this being one of the last sets of unemployment figures released before November, you can be sure that the presidential candidates and their supporters will be talking up their very different points of view on unemployment and jobs.
It will be up to the voters to decide which point of view suits their attitudes on what the future holds for jobs.
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