Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg takes every opportunity these days to mention what he says are two major problems facing the country’s economy: enormous public debt and high unemployment. But on the radio show he appears on with John Gambling on Friday mornings, Mr. Bloomberg took his comments further than usual.

“You have a lot of kids graduating college can’t find jobs,” he said in response to a question about the poverty rate. “That’s what happened in Cairo. That’s what happened in Madrid,” he continued, referring to the uprising that overthrew President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt and the more recent protests against the Spanish government’s austerity measures. “You don’t want those kinds of riots here.”

Riots or no, Mr. Bloomberg does have reason to be concerned about unemployment. He frequently describes New York City as having recovered from the recession more fully than the rest of the country. At an event on Tuesday to announce a new round of job creation and training grants, he noted that, while the nation as a whole had gained back only one out of every four jobs lost during the recession, New York City had gained back all of the lost jobs and added some, too.