Where Have all the Young Men Gone? Long Time Passing.
By Anne Dachel
I came across several discussions on the shortage of male workers in America, and I found headlines like: “Millions of Men Missing from the Labor Force,” (Fox News).
Naturally we should all be asking why men are missing from the workforce and not women.
The reports suggest several causes for this labor shortage: lack of job training, criminal background checks, living on welfare, videogames, "gender phobia" according to the National Review, because we are failing to "valorize male work." Articles in the Atlantic and the Seattle Times mention that the high number of men who are unemployed was due to disability.
Even President Obama issued a statement on the decline of the male labor force when he was in office. (June 2016, The Long-Term Decline in Prime-Age Male Labor Force Participation, Office of the President of the United States) https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/default/files/page/files/20160620_cea_primeage_male_lfp.pdf
June 22, 2017, Bloomberg.com: The World’s Workers Have Bigger Problems Than a Robot Apocalypse
The big problem today is too few workers, not too many. Maine is so short of help that the governor conditionally commuted sentences of 17 state prisoners in May, in part so that they could take jobs. Michael Feroli, the chief U.S. economist of JPMorgan Chase & Co., headlined a research note, “The labor market’s getting tighter than a rusted lug nut.”…
Dimon points to the “staggering” decline in labor force participation by men of prime working age, 25 to 54. “There’s something wrong,” he said in a conference call with reporters on June 6.
June 14, 2017, Napa Valley (CA) Register: Due to labor shortage, female workers are a growing presence in Napa vineyards
Over the past few years scenes like this have become increasingly common, defining the transformation of a vineyard workforce, plagued by labor shortage and fewer male workers, that has coped by taking on women workers at an unprecedented rate, not only at Renteria, but across Napa and throughout the entire state.
June 7, 2017, Fox Business News: Jamie Dimon on America's big problem: Millions of men missing from labor market |
Don’t tell J.P. Morgan Chase (JPM) CEO Jamie Dimon the U.S. lacks enough people to fill open jobs and get the U.S. economy moving faster in the long run.
The banking VIP and current chairman of the Business Roundtable told reporters this week that America has a big problem: millions of prime-aged men have dropped out of the labor force.
Dimon pointed out the share of men ages 25 to 54 who are considered part of the labor force has declined to around 88% from as high as 97% a half-century ago. In effect, about 10 million men have gone missing.
That one figure alone, he suggested, shows the U.S. labor market is not as tight as it appears despite a 4.3% unemployment rate that’s at a 16-year low.
“That’s not demographics, folks. That’s a huge number,” Dimon said Tuesday in a conference call hosted by the round table. “There is something wrong.”
March 22, 2017, The Atlantic: Maybe the Economy Isn't the Reason Why So Many American Men Aren't Working
Many experts have blamed a poor job market, but new research indicates that an overlooked cause may be poor health.
...In 1957, 97 percent of men in America ages 25 to 54 were either working or looking for work. Today, only 89 percent are.
...In a 2016 report, President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers examined the declining labor-force participation rate and suggested that a drop-off in good jobs for low-skilled men was part of the explanation. Wages, the report theorized, are so low for many jobs that don’t require a college education that men don’t find it worth it to seek out bad jobs. A lack of job training and job-search assistance—when compared to other OECD countries—makes it more difficult for men to move into more lucrative fields. And a surge in incarceration has made it more difficult for men to find work when they leave prison, according to the report.
...First, that as social welfare programs have gotten more generous, they’ve lured men away from trying to find a job, and, second, that a large share of the men who are not working are ones with criminal records who have not been able to find a job, and have thus given up.
...But there’s another theory that deserves mentioning, especially because it fits with recent research about the declining health outcomes among American men. That theory suggests that American men are dropping out of the workforce because they are suffering from serious health conditions that make it difficult for them to work. As their health deteriorates, they’re getting on pain medications, which then make it even more difficult to re-enter the workforce.
Princeton economist Alan Krueger argued this theory late last year at a conference at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, and in an October 2016 paper circulated by the National Bureau of Economic Research. In his research, he found that almost half of working-age men who were not in the labor force were taking pain medication on a daily basis, and that two-thirds of those men were taking prescription medication.
November 23, 2016, Seattle Times: Why men of prime age aren’t in the labor force
Economists say increased globalization and the decline in factory jobs play a major role in pushing prime-age men, particularly those with less education, out of the workforce. But that doesn’t explain why the problem is worse in the U.S. than in most other advanced nations. ...
Too many men in their prime don’t have a job and aren’t even looking for one. Experts trying to figure out the reasons are probing the roles of criminal background checks, painkillers and even video games. ...
A little more than half of the men reported they were ill or disabled, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. About 14 percent are going to school. And about 20 percent said they were either retired or handling home responsibilities.
October 7, 2016, National Review: The Crisis of Masculinity
Almost one out of four men of prime working age (25–54) are not working. Since 1948, the percentage of men aged 20 to 64 who aren’t working has doubled. Fewer working-age men are working today than in 1930, in the heart of the Great Depression.
Most of this decline, however, has taken place since 1965. Between 1965 and 2015, the share of working-age men who are jobless more than doubled, from 10 percent to 22 percent. Among “prime age” men, the percentage without jobs shot from 6 percent to nearly 16 percent. Some of these men are in training or education programs. But the vast majority of men in this age range who are receiving training or are in school are job holders, working part-time or working full-time and going to school part-time.
June 21, 2016, Brookings Institution: Where are the nonworking prime-age men?
...The CEA [Council of Economic Advisors] report documents a number of possible explanations for this trend, including increasing rates of women in the workforce, rising disability insurance claims, falling demand for less-skilled workers, and barriers to employment for those with criminal records.
THERE’S MORE TO CONSIDER
This all makes sense, if you think about it. We’ve had several decades where predominately boys are labeled with autism, boys being four times more likely to be diagnosed with the disorder than girls. And while I’m not saying that this is the only factor behind the decline of male workers, it’s certainly a possibility.
These are the facts:
According to the National Center for Educational Statistics: Boys are 30 percent more likely than girls to flunk or drop out of school;
When it comes to grades and homework, girls outperform boys in elementary, secondary, high school, college, and even graduate school;
Boys are four to five times more likely than girls to be diagnosed with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD);
Women outnumber men in higher education with 56 percent of bachelor's degrees and 55 percent of graduate degrees going to women.
According to the U.S. Department of Education:
Boys make up two-thirds of the students in special education and are five times more likely to be classified as hyperactive.
Oct 26, 2016, TheEdAdvocate: Black Boys in Crisis: Why Are So Many of Them in Special Education?
Oct 23, 2013, UK Telegraph: Boys 'much more likely to be labelled with special needs'
May 22, 2013, Fordham Institute:
A similarly disproportionate number of boys populate the specific disabled categories. In fact, every single category except one (deaf-blindness) has more boys than girls.[1] The bullets below, and as displayed in chart 1, present the male-female percentages for the state’s top five special education categories, by student enrollment in 2011-12:
Specific learning disabilities: 64,130 boys (61 percent of this group) and 41,133 girls (39 percent);
Other health impaired – minor: 23,923 boys (70 percent) and 10,152 girls (30 percent);
Speech and language impairments: 21,361 boys (67 percent) and 10,340 girls (33 percent);
Cognitive Disabilities (mental retardation): 14,887 boys (58 percent) and 10,852 girls (42 percent);
Autism: 13,816 boys (85 percent) and 2,485 girls (15 percent).
(Notice that it’s not only boys who end up in sped, it’s specifically black males. That makes a person think of the 2004 vaccine study that showed black males were much more susceptible to MMR injury than white boys.)
After the male student takeover in sped in the last two decades, is it any surprise that we’re missing a big segment of the adult male workforce?
Despite the fact that officials have more concern about measles in Minneapolis than the generation of sick and disabled children growing into adulthood, they not going away. In the coming years they will massively change the demographics of the U.S. The “better diagnosing, greater awareness” explanation that was used to cover up the autism epidemic will have to be expanded to somehow include the missing male workers and all the dependent adults filling group homes across America.
Anne Dachel is Media Editor for Age of Autism.
To the person who mentioned that MGTOW nonsense that movement is a stupid as feminism if not more so. Men checking out (MGTOWs) is dangerous for society because these lazy bigoted nerds sit in front of a computer not working and trolling people. These movements have nothing to do with autism a disability and other disability likes an increase in cerebral palsy that causes both physical and developmental aliments and makes it very hard to work and these conditions both effect males more. Do not forget about the drug plague that is just growing in supposedly good rich neighborhoods and in the rural south. We need a Marshal Plan for Americas disabled to realize their potential as tax payers not social security recipients.
Posted by: Willie | July 22, 2017 at 10:34 AM
@susan welch, I'm glad you also enjoyed the discussion!
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | July 21, 2017 at 05:13 PM
@Scott, I would recommend not being quick to dismiss a gender/androgen enhanced toxicology as playing a role here (it's probably not just thimerosal combined with testosterone, but this discussion is highly pertinent IMO):
https://youtu.be/oMXZEFX7jUM?t=3m26s
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | July 21, 2017 at 05:12 PM
Jeanette B - thanks very much for the Del/Billy link. Just watched it all and thoroughly enjoyed it. Del is always an inspiration to watch.
Posted by: susan welch | July 21, 2017 at 03:42 PM
Perusing these comments that have made it through the filtering process suggest that the real reasons have been filtered out of the comments, i.e., the war on masculinity, the denigration of men and all things masculine, presenting men as oppressors, privileged, abusers, the relentless promotion of women in education and the workplace, all this have resulted in men simply just "checking out" of the system. Go study MGTOW.
Posted by: Scott | July 21, 2017 at 11:36 AM
Cathy Jameson;
I have a friend on facebook that engaged me.
His take on it is that it is bad parents that don't know how to handle their kids.
That you could give him any child and he and his wife would have just as much success with any kid, just like he had success raising his kids.
I am not sure what his daughter is all about. He just does not say. But she is well old enough to be married. I guess she has a job, but she does not shine like his pharmacist son. His son is 40. He just got married to a 30 year old.
Getting married at 40 . Well, at any rate not ot burst his bubble of raising great all around human beings is all about common sense and those with soft brain injuries just does not fit into his reality.
Posted by: Benedetta | July 19, 2017 at 09:27 PM
I'm about 25 minutes into a great discussion between Del Bigtree and Billy DeMoss here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T6r_UFsbr9k
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | July 19, 2017 at 02:44 PM
Yes autism and other disabilities is robbing young men of their ability to work but what about the other factors like drug use, criminal record and even lack of public transportation? So called SJWs and vaccines are not important that here people what is important is the high number of male dependency on government and family. we need another civilian conservation corps to train men for jobs and employ them for a few years as well. of these 95 million both male and female about a 1/3 will never work in their lives due to disabilities and other issues so we need to be honest that this number will always be high.
Posted by: will | July 18, 2017 at 11:42 PM
I'm waiting for an update too.
The evidence of harm is there yet there's no credible response from the CDC, FDA, or pediatricians. Instead there's a press blackout, poorly designed studies, and mindless disclaimers regarding vaccines.
These people know what's going on, they just don't care. It makes me sick.
Posted by: kws | July 18, 2017 at 06:08 PM
For 10 years now 1 in 25 boys have had Autism which is Brain Encephalitis from Aluminum, thimerosal/mercury, formaldehyde, polysorbate 80 and other poisons shot into them 72 times and counting. I am awaiting an update. 1 in 5 High school kids have ADHD, 1 in 5 children are also Learning Disabled. This is NOT a robot generated problem, not a corporation generated problem, not an aid to dependent children problem, not welfare, and not the water, Today 1 in every 3 toddlers requires Speech, occupational, pt or additional therapies. It is because they are being POISONED in the womb, poisoned the day they are born with 250 MCG of Aluminum, poisoned at 2, 4, 6, 12, 15 months of age. They are also being poisoned at age 4 or 5, then again to go into 6th grade, high school and now REPOISONED to go to college, poisoned again while expecting , poisoned if they are in medical school, poisoned if they work at a hospital, poisoned while under anesthesia during surgery and more.
Posted by: Shelley Tzorfas | July 18, 2017 at 04:41 PM
What?!! Can't have your producers and consume them too?!? What are the chances of discussions occurring about gender-based differences in response to environmental exposures (particularly injected ones)?
I wonder why the corporate media is not talking about the Merck production shut down via hackers? Or should that be "hackers?"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wc5BVtWesI
This going on in Italy right now...
https://www.facebook.com/wearevaxxed/videos/497737303906884/
...which the corporate media probably won't cover either. I wonder if the Italian media is U.S.-style quiet about all these nation-wide vaccine mandate protests?
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | July 18, 2017 at 02:13 PM
We have a huge problem at this point. Pesticides, vaccines other environmental assaults put autism around 10%, boys being more affected. Anyone in construction or physical labour jobs will tell you that it's extremely difficult to find healthy young males. Of course many are studying but that still doesn't account for the dearth. Many of the young people are pot smoking non-thinkers and governments seem to want it this way. Trudeau the Canadian Prime Minuster won largely due to this issue. World leaders, the Zuckerbergs, Gates and the deep state seem to love the feminized, debilitated population trend.
Posted by: Trutherseeker | July 18, 2017 at 01:46 PM
The main cause of men being unemployed is mainly robotic technology replacing workers whether the product is made in the USA or not. To some extent illegal immigration and outsourcing takes away jobs from US born people who are included in those department of labor statistics as unemployed or not in workforce. Disability including autism being on the rise certainly is a big contributor but only 15% or 20% of the number of unemployed or not in workforce. Lastly what many will not talk about because of a right wing version of political correctness is the opium type drug plague in the southern US because 80% or 90% of these addicts are white males and an employers does not want dangerous drug addicts because of safety, security, reasons as well a business reputation. Some companies have hired refugees over "pill billies" because of lack of drug use and a slighlty better work ethic. All of these problems are causing men to exit the work force in droves. Many with a disability especially autism and developmental disabilities will never work so the statistics from the DOL may not even include them as unemployed or not in work force. I imagine things are very similar in Canada and other English countries about the robots, outsourcing, and the drug use and its effect on the employment of men.
Posted by: will | July 18, 2017 at 12:51 PM
This can't be possible. The SJW's keep telling us that males are privileged. I have to suspect that patriarchal researchers are cooking the books.
Posted by: David Weiner | July 18, 2017 at 12:33 PM
I took some liberty and edited Dimon's quote just a bit.
“That’s not [genetics] folks. That’s a huge number,” Dimon said Tuesday in a conference call hosted by the round table. “There is something wrong.”
Posted by: michael | July 17, 2017 at 07:42 PM
I agree that vaccines are assuredly playing a role, but there may be many factors.
I can tell you as someone who has been in large corporate America for a long time, the last 15 years or so have brought a sea change in HR practices and workplace demographics. In my industry, the rule these days is that over 40s are at risk, and over 50s are mostly gone except for upper management. Also, almost a third of my company's employees are contract workers-a stunning statistic and an invisible one too. Most of these workers are H1-Bs in their 20s and 30s. It is all about economics-companies wanting to suppress wages and minimize medical costs. The US is awash in over-50 talent (including men) that can't get an interview, much less a job. And the Zuckerbergs and Dimons of the world like it that way, happy to blame it all on opioids and video games.
Posted by: Jenna | July 17, 2017 at 07:31 PM
I just shared Anne's post with this comment with my family/friends:
Pharaoh then commanded all his subjects,
"Throw into the river every boy that is born to the Hebrews,
but you may let all the girls live." [Exodus 1:22]
I was the reader at Mass today. Above is the last verse from the first reading. It took my breath away, especially since the last thing I'd read before going to church was Anne's article. In that article, Anne asks, "Where have our young men gone?" Well, they've been sacrificed, sacrificed for the greater good. Who's going to suffer because of that? Besides the young men, those who make up greater good will suffer. Who's going to fix that, change that, or prevent that from continuing to happen?
Who?
Will you?
--
I'm curious if my non-autism/vax injury friends will say anything. The last time I posted a vaccine-related story, I got zero replies. It's discouraging, but it won't stop me from continuing to share these kinds of stories. Thanks, Anne, for not giving up either.
xo, Cat
Posted by: Cathy Jameson | July 17, 2017 at 03:46 PM
So many younger men went into the military.
First there was the draft, and many of them (except rich overprivileged Orange Persons) actually were required to.
Then there was the inducement of educational benefits following military service.
Also, for a lot of lower-income boys it was a way of getting a "job."
And in return, the military ruined their health. Vaccines; exposure to toxic chemicals from tanks, planes, etc.; plus other sorts of exposures.
How many of the "can't work because of bad health" men are there today, who were previously in the military? Versus how many are there who were not . . . ?
And of those who were not, how many can we find whose mothers were subjected to extreme stress while preganat?
Just those two very, very widespread factors -- each separately, or (worse) taken together -- can account for a lot of "poor health" in males.
Posted by: Nonnymouse | July 17, 2017 at 01:55 PM
Saw it coming. As soon as the headlines stated autism more likely in males. ADHD more likely in males.
It's maddening when we hear how wonderful it is that more women are going to college now. Women are rising, etc. That would be great, but are they filling a vacuum left by males? I would say very adamantly, yes.
Boys are not choosing to reject education, etc. They are not choosing to "go missing." They have had their potential and their physical and mental health STOLEN from them.
Just another example of not looking at the obvious.
Posted by: Cynthia Cournoyer | July 17, 2017 at 11:30 AM
Autism and addiction. The double-A...
Posted by: Sue M | July 17, 2017 at 11:15 AM
I'm missing from the labor force since I have became a full time caretaker for my child. He developed severe autism immediately following his mmr vaccine. College degrees and experience mean nothing now. My colleagues wonder, what happened to kws ? The answer is simple, my son has autism and helping him is more important than increasing shareholder profits.
Posted by: kws | July 17, 2017 at 10:25 AM
Honestly, *ALL* of these various factors are in play, AND, the "GREG B.'S", - the Global Ruling Elites, & Global Banksters", *WANT* things this way.... We're in a post-industrial society, yet the 1% just get richer, while the poor get poorer.... And the masses get screwed.... I have been rendered UNEMPLOYABLE, despite wanting to work. The system prefers me on disability. Funny thing though, now they're complaining about a lack of workers, as society and the workforce in this State ages....oh, and did I mention that the system has made me unemployable, despite my wanting to work....????....
I call it "JOKE Rehab", not "VocRehab".....except I'm NOT laughing.... There's little doubt in my mind, that I would have been diagnosed and drugged as "ADD/ADHD" in school, if I were 20 years younger. And we've barely begun to scratch the surface of rehabilitation/therapy/recovery....
Let's not all lose all hope, OK?....
Posted by: Bill | July 17, 2017 at 09:30 AM
Thanks Anne
As you know I have been trying to draw attention to the catastrophic situation in the UK with the autism rate in London possibly now around 10% in London among younger children (so heading for 20% in boys?). This is before we have any fall out from Men B vaccine which will begin to emerge next year, or Hep B vaccine which comes on tap next month:
http://www.ageofautism.com/2017/05/10000-new-cases-of-autism-in-london-a-year-as-bureaucrats-plan-to-dump-children.html
Posted by: John Stone | July 17, 2017 at 08:37 AM
I only looked at one article Anne cited, but I think part of the problem is that the American corporate culture is extremely physically and psychologically demanding of employees, much more so than ever before. Salaried employees are expected to work as many hours as needed to get the job done. Overtime rules over 40 hours that used to protect employees from exploitation are gone for many jobs. Now there is mandatory overtime at the employer's whim, sometimes with time and a half, sometimes with straight pay. And there is an expectation of round the clock connectivity and response to the corporation's needs. A kind of slavery. Union protection has largely been removed. There is no loyalty to workers, no expectation of retirement with a company or a pension at the end. Instead, employees expect to have to change jobs frequently as their employers' needs change or as the company leaves town. There is no stability in the American workplace by design. Workers are viewed a "human resources" to be used up. This is demoralizing for the employee.
I think that some of the problem at the younger end of the scale has to do with vaccine injury and other toxic insult from growing up American. For the older men I think it is more being beaten down by the corporate culture and the medical industrial complex that feeds off of and milks problems with debilitating drugs rather than genuine care or cure. Supposedly 1 in 6 Americans takes prescription psychiatric drugs. That can't be helping the situation either.
Posted by: Linda1 | July 17, 2017 at 08:19 AM
Vaccines our old hobby horse on here AND ITS TRUE but also as Alex Jones says they are even turning the freaking frogs gay…
http://news.berkeley.edu/2010/03/01/frogs/
Atrazine, one of the world’s most widely used pesticides, wreaks havoc with the sex lives of adult male frogs, emasculating three-quarters of them and turning one in 10 into females, according to a new study by University of California, Berkeley, biologists.
The 75 percent that are chemically castrated are essentially “dead” because of their inability to reproduce in the wild, reports UC Berkeley’s Tyrone B. Hayes, professor of integrative biology.
“These male frogs are missing testosterone and all the things that testosterone controls, including sperm. So their fertility is as low as 10 percent in some cases, and that is only if we isolate those animals and pair them with females,” he said. “In an environment where they are competing with unexposed animals, they have zero chance of reproducing.”
Pharma for Prison
MMR RIP
Posted by: Angus Files | July 17, 2017 at 07:44 AM
"......But there’s another theory that deserves mentioning, especially because it fits with recent research about the declining health outcomes among American men. That theory suggests that American men are dropping out of the workforce because they are suffering from serious health conditions that make it difficult for them to work. As their health deteriorates, they’re getting on pain medications, which then make it even more difficult to re-enter the workforce."
We ought not be surprised .. at least a DECADE ago ..the CDC has informed us that "1 in 6" American children suffered childhood development problems .. and .. as far as I know .. the CDC has done absolutely NOTHING to identify WHY so many children are having problems developing NORMALLY .. as ALL previous generations in the US did?
Recent article claimed adolescent suicide is becoming a major problem .. with all kinds of theories to explain why .. such as ... "bullying on social media". However ..the article failed to mention whether prescribing pyschothropic drugs to the "1 child in 6" who were diagnosed ADD/ADHD at a very early age .. with some receiving heavier medications as they age .. could be a contributing factor.
I think it safe to assume the CDC will not study the suicide rates between those children prescribed medications from early childhood .... with the suicide rates of those children who were medication free.
Posted by: bob moffit | July 17, 2017 at 07:03 AM