Sunday, June 03, 2018
Constants and variables 93, lazy edition
As usual one of the econ sites was doomporning about workforce dropouts. As usual most of the commenters jumped instantly to LAZY WELFARE BUMS LOSERS SOYBOYS 47% LARGESSE etc.
The numbers don't justify the jump. Obviously some people are lazy, but many millions of "lazy" people were working steadily before 2008 and are not working now.
The actual graph shows linear increase in labor participation from 1965 to 1985, approx constant until 2008. After 2008, sudden drop, no recovery.
The peak in 1985 was 67%. Current is 62%. Not dramatic.
The often heard "Half of adults are not working" is comparing with the wrong max. The optimum workforce, the best we can do, is 67%. We have 5% of adults who were working 10 years ago and aren't working now. We're 5% short of the max.
Are those 5% lazy?
The total available laborforce is 170 million. 5% of 170 million is 8.5 million. If the problem was in the workers, we'd have 8.5 million jobs open and looking for workers. But in fact we have something like 200k jobs open.
Therefore: The workers didn't change. The jobs DISAPPEARED. Or more precisely the jobs moved to India and Mexico and China.
Labels: Constants and Variables
¶ 9:02 AM
