Sep 7 2012
The Great Jobs Mystery: Why Are So Many Men Dropping Out of the Workforce?
TheAtlantic.com
.
.
.
So, one interpretation of the Great Recession is that it has accelerated our labor participation fall-off by five to ten years. Older workers, who have faced the worst long-term unemployment crisis (they're more expensive; harder to train; and possibly subject to ageism) might be retiring early. As we've reported, the recession has also coincided with a sharp increase in applications for disability benefits and it's clear that, in addition to the one million older Americans who have been looking for work unsuccessfully for more than six months, hundreds of thousands have dropped out and retired early.
And that brings up the second reason why more people aren't participating in the work force: They don't think there's any work for them.
.
.
.
The share of people not in the labor force who say they do want a job has turned sharply up since March, hitting a post-recession high. Here's that graph:
Oh, and what about the guys? Men's participation hit an all-time low in August. This is a record, but it's not a surprise. Male participation has been in outright decline since the 1950s, and the share of working-age women who are actually working has practically doubled since the late 1940s. Here's that picture, with men in BLUE, women in RED, and total participation in GREEN.
.
.
.
But there are two more forces pulling down men's participation. In fact, they two of the most important economic trends of the last 50 years: The rise of women and the growth of the safety net. Dual-earner households have allowed men to either choose to not work or to retire early. That's part of the decline. But, perhaps even more importantly, the increase in Social Security payments, plus Medicare and Medicaid, have allowed older men to stop working and rely on government insurance programs to protect them from the risk of elderly poverty and medical catastrophe.
Full article: http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/09/the-great-jobs-mystery-why-are-so-many-men-dropping-out-of-the-workforce/262100/?google_editors_picks=true
Gold is $1,581/oz today. When it hits $2,000, it will be up 26.5%. Let's see how long that takes. - De 3/11/2013 - ANSWER: 7 Years, 5 Months
| 