U.S. Labor Force Has A Dude Problem

Job growth continues to grow, and the labor force is growing as more unemployed workers begin hunting for gigs – well, some of them, anyway. Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that about 7 million men aged 25 to 54 are neither employed nor “available for work,” a number that puzzles and concerns economists. Having that enormous number of men in their prime not looking for jobs has kept the labor force stuck near its lowest level since the 1970s. About half of the men reported that they were ill or disabled, about 14 percent are going to school, and another 20 percent said they were retired or handling home responsibilities. Economists are exploring reasons for the trend, including increased globalization cannibalizing manufacturing jobs, criminal background checks, painkillers, or even video games. There are no clear reasons why the problem is worse in the U.S. than in other economically advanced nations. “It’s terrible. There’s absolutely nothing good that comes out of it,” Nicholas Eberstadt, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute think tank, told the Los Angeles Times. “It is certainly near the center of so much that is sad and wrong about the way our society and economy are performing today.”