Posted on 10/06/2014 10:42:21 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
America's jobs picture is seeing huge improvement, with robust numbers that are giving investors confidence in the economy. The U.S. added 248,000 jobs last month, bringing the unemployment rate below 6 percent.
But one part of that picture is still a puzzle: People continue to stop looking for work, and in doing so, are dropping out of the labor pool. In fact, the participation rate in the labor force has fallen to 62.7 percent -- its lowest level since early 1978.
How can this be? As the job market heats up and the unemployment rate falls, wouldn't that mean more people are looking for work, not less?
"The decline is without precedent," Bob Funk, chief executive of global staffing company Express Employment Professionals, told CBS MoneyWatch. Government tracking of employment statistics go back to 1948, he said, "and a decline like this has never happened since then."
There's no clear reason why people are leaving the workforce, and the issue has ignited a fierce debate among economists. One trend that they seem to agree on? About half of the decline is due to baby boomers entering retirement years.
The other half of decline gets a little fuzzy. Funk notes that some portion of the unemployed either don't want to work or don't think they can find a job. His company commissioned a poll of unemployed in May, he said, and found that 47 percent have completely given up looking for work. "That's a real problem," he said.
The labor force participation rate was around 66 percent of the population in 2007 before falling to 62.7 percent.
Some economists say the expansion of food stamp and disability programs are keeping people out of the labor pool. Others says that young people are dropping out, partly because more are going to college
(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...
Do you have a social anxiety disorder that prevents you from pounding the pavement, filling out job applications? That's a disability! Obesity from sitting around on your couch all day drinking beer? That's a disability! So is your alcoholism! Depressed because a high-paying job won't magically materialize in your lap? Congrats! You're officially disabled! KA-CHING!!! $$$$$$$
Does anyone really believe that the unemployment rate is below 6 per cent? Why would the federal labor department employees be honest with their information when the ATF, the IRS, the EPA, the DOJ, the White House staff, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Barack Obama, HHS (ala Obamacare), ICE, NSA, John Clapper, and many others have all lied to us multiple times about the matters for which they are responsible.
The very minimum that we should expect from our elected officials at all levels and our government employees at all levels is integrity. Without integrity all the time nothing else matters
Bingo.
Our current confiscatory taxes make it… foolish to think that work pays off, add that with the unacceptable government policies (IRS targeting, NSA domestic espionage, etc) and there's real moral objection to paying taxes. (Incidentally, Fast & Furious is technically the government aiding/supporting terrorism, which is illegal under the US Code — therefore if you don't pay taxes you are a lawbreaker, but if you do pay you are also a lawbreaker.)
Don’t think the disability scam is limited to people you don’t know. I know of at least 5 people receiving va disability for specious reasons, imho. It seemed to me that I was one of the few people not trying to milk the system.
I'm a dragon, er, I mean saver.
I've been living off of savings for coming on two years — severely underemployed, even when not flat-out unemployed.
Not necessarily. I am nearly sixty and I was offered two jobs on the same day.
I think one of the things that may have happened is with married couples. One of them lost their job and so ended up staying home with the kids. They were able to get food stamps and weren’t paying for child care and found that with the extra help they could get by with one income.
Umm, Kim Peterson - it's called 'perverse incentives'...
-— How can this be? -—
Oh! Oh-oh! Pick me!
OMG!
Everyone is leaving the workforce!
Our economy will crash if we don’t bring on the illegals!
Several ways. Some families are down to one income and government benefits. Some are being supported by their parents. And a whole lot of them participate in an underground economy.
Couples are no longer getting married so one of them, usually the male, has a job and the mother gets full government help.
There are a lot of divorced women with children who get enough child support to make their lives livable as long as they have government benefits. I know my ex DIL has finally gotten a job because she lost half her child support this year and in less than 2 years will lose the rest and also her government benefits because she will have no children at home.
Someone I’m close to who has learned to work the system informed me that being homeless has now been linked to an anxiety disorder (being homeless makes you anxious of course) that qualifies you for disability and other services.
“leaving the workforce”?
Now THAT’S communist propaganda since the workforce laid off those people.
Why people leave the work force:
( in my family and friends)
1.Lost job in 2007, out of work 18 months, not hired because of “lost skills”. Took part time jobs, now retired.
2. Lost job in 2008, ran out unemployment insurance,found out doing with a little less could make it on one salary.
3. Went on SSI disability, subsidized housing.
4. Making more on government handouts than would at part time job.
These are some of the personal reasons my family, and friends are not in the workforce.
6 in all.
Because the "safety net" has been turned into a comfortable hammock, reducing the answer to the very simple "because they can".
Maybe they are depleting their savings or they are working for cash unreported .... or both. Maybe they have little or no debt and can slash their expenses to the bare minimum and live with someone who is working. There are many possibilities.
If many illegal aliens can live in this country and survive off the radar, then so can many citizens.
Also, self employed sole proprietors are, I believe, not counted as participating in the workforce.
My husband left the workforce because he was laid off in November of 2013 and he has been unable to find anything in his field. We sold our home in California and moved to Texas in August and he is still looking for work..
It is highly unlikely he will ever have the same sort of job which is unfortunate as he has only had 2 jobs in his 20 year carrer.
From the SSA website:
“In 1999, the Ticket to Work and Work Incentives Improvement Act made further major changes to work incentives. ... The law prohibits SSA from using a beneficiary’s return to work to trigger a continuing disability review, prohibits termination for medical improvement if the beneficiary is using the Ticket, and precludes SSA from using evidence from work to show medical improvement.”
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