Work is an essential foundation of any stable social order.

Despite all the Office Space parodies of life in a cubicle, and however much we bemoan having to get up on Monday morning or applaud when we punch out on Fridays, it is work, not money or love or anything else, that makes the world go round. It is by work that we earn our daily bread and thus support not only ourselves but our families. It is work that disciplines the soul. It is work that produces the goods and services we consume. It is work that makes economies function and grow. It is work that gives expression to creative energy, or at least the capacity to make a positive contribution to society and derive meaning from life. In short, without labor, all the things we love about our lives are lost. Depression, anarchy, rootlessness, scarcity, and many other social ills would be like a plague upon a new daily grind of leisure.

Thus, it is with great concern that social scientists are taking note of a trend that sees men leaving the work force in droves.

This dystopia will probably never actually come to pass, of course, but the apocalypse depicted above does give an indication of the critical importance of work to the maintenance of any social order in any era. Thus, it is with great concern that social scientists are taking note of a trend that sees men leaving the work force in droves: in particular, men in the prime of their lives, or those between the ages of 25 and 54. Well, maybe not in droves. But over the past half-century, there has been an alarming drainage of men, especially men with lower levels of educational attainment, from the labor force. That simple fact is addressed in a June 2016 report by the President’s Council of Economic Advisors (CEA), as well as in the research of scholars. According to the CEA report, the labor force participation rate for ‘prime-age men’ (i.e. men between the ages of 25 and 54) has fallen from a peak of 98 percent in 1954 to 88 percent in 2016. These data can be confirmed by examining labor force participation rate data on the website of the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

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The trend has been particularly striking for black men.

For example, according to BLS data, the participation rate for ‘prime-age’ black men has declined from approximately 90 percent to approximately 80 percent from 1972 to 2015, compared to a decline from roughly 95 percent to roughly 90 percent for white men over the same time period. The same downward trend is true for every demographic of men examined by the CEA report, and has been particularly acute, in the words of the CEA report, among men ‘who are black, less educated, nonparents, native-born, living in the South, and veterans.’ On the flip side, it is still the case that a large majority of men are in the labor force, but as economist Larry Summers notes, a ‘simple linear trend suggests that by mid-century about a quarter of men between 25 and 54 will not be working at any moment.’ Summers actually expects more than a third of men to be out of the labor force by mid-century, and cites reasons like technological innovations that will eliminate the jobs of drivers and cashiers, as well as declining marriage rates, insufficient improvement in the education and health of the work force, and the fact that, as he claims, ‘non-work is contagious’ and thus ‘is likely to grow exponentially rather than at a linear rate.’

So why is this happening?

No one knows for sure, but many are trying to answer the question. As noted above, Larry Summers identifies some of the potential factors that explain the trend, such as technological innovations that make certain professions obsolete. The CEA report, in turn, argues that demand-side factors explain more of the trend than supply-side factors. A demand-side explanation indicates that men leave the work force because the demand for their labor has declined. A supply-side explanation indicates that men leave the work force as a matter of choice, perhaps because they choose to be stay-at-home dads, go to school, have greater access to social assistance from government sources, or prefer to spend their time on leisure activities. In citing demand-side factors, the CEA report argues that technological changes are creating a world in which there is less and less demand for lower-skilled workers, which not only makes employers reluctant to hire them, but also depresses the wage and makes men less motivated to want to seek work.

The CEA report also examines institutional factors like job search assistance, job training, and paid leave policies, pointing out that while the decline in prime-age male labor force participation is not limited to the United States, it is more pronounced in the U.S. in part because the U.S. provides less institutional support aimed at helping men remain in, or return to, the labor force. The implication is that the U.S. is less effective at ‘supporting’ workers as they try to remain active in the labor force by attaining new skills and searching for new jobs. Moreover, the CEA report states that ‘[t]he United States has the lowest level of labor market regulation, the fewest employment protections, the third-lowest minimum cost of labor, and among the lowest rates of collective bargaining coverage among OECD countries, according to the OECD’s Going For Growth Indicators, as shown in Table 3.’ To the extent that lower rates of collective bargaining and low minimum costs of labor depress wages, they may discourage men from remaining in the work force.

A final institutional factor cited by the CEA report is imprisonment.

The increase in mass incarceration witnessed over the last few decades, strictly speaking, would increase the labor participation rate because inmates are not included in the civilian non-institutionalized workforce. But over the long-term, mass incarceration may indirectly contribute to the decline in labor force participation by men because ‘[t]hose who emerge from the criminal justice system suffer stigma, hiring restrictions, and potentially reduced ability to work as a result, reducing the demand for their labor.’

The CEA report is not the only voice on this matter. A new book by American Enterprise Institute scholar Nicholas Eberstadt posits that past imprisonment may be a key variable contributing to the trend of men leaving the labor force. As quoted in an article by Bloomberg columnist Justin Fox, Eberstadt writes:

A single variable—having a criminal record—is a key missing piece in explaining why work rates and LFPRs [labor-force participation rates] have collapsed much more dramatically in America than other affluent Western societies over the past two generations. This single variable also helps explain why the collapse has been so much greater for American men than women and why it has been so much more dramatic for African American men and men with low educational attainment than for other prime-age men in the United States.

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In addition to citing the commentary about imprisonment in Eberstadt’s book, Justin Fox identifies potential explanations such as technological advances and globalization. He also cites the work of economists David Autor, David Dorn, and Gordon Hanson which has demonstrated that the loss of manufacturing jobs in the U.S. is due primarily to the dramatic increase in imports from China since 2000.

Men are not running from the labor force because they are frightened by a brave new world. Rather, the brave new world seems to be leaving them behind.

It cannot be denied that the downward trend in prime-age male labor force participation has coincided with dramatic structural changes in our culture and economy, such as the rise of the digital economy and globalization. Correlation is not causation, but the CEA report and many economists do not think they are unrelated. Men are not running from the labor force because they are frightened by a brave new world. Rather, the brave new world seems to be leaving them behind. The world we live in wants college-educated workers. The world of lifetime employment in a factory with a blue-collar salary and benefits is no more. This reality has proved a harsh one for lower-skilled men who have not been able to adapt. In many cases, they are giving up. The world of leisure seems a lot more enticing.

Which leads to yet another factor behind the decline worth discussing: the increasing attractiveness of leisure. The CEA report is not blind to the issue, writing:

The largest difference in how men in and out of the labor force spend their time is in time spent on leisure activities—socializing, relaxing and leisure, with nonparticipating men spending almost twice as much time on these activities than those prime-age men overall, and more than twice as much time watching television. Together, these patterns suggest that men are, on average, not dropping out of the labor force to specialize in home production or to invest in skills to improve their future labor market opportunities.

According to Erik Hurst, a professor at the University of Chicago, leisure is not unrelated to technology. In an essay adapted from a convocation speech given to students at Chicago, he explains his thesis that increasing numbers of low-skilled men, particularly younger men in their twenties, are choosing to live in their parents’ basement and play video games. In economic-speak, supply-side factors are not to be ignored.

He cites some shocking statistics.

For prime-age men as a whole, Hurst notes that in the fifteen years ‘[b]etween 2000 and 2015, the employment rate for lower-skilled men and women between the ages of 21 and 55 fell by 7.5 percentage points. (I’m going to refer to ‘lower skilled’ as anyone with less than a bachelor’s degree.)’ He continues: ‘To be concrete, just over 84 percent of lower-skilled men aged 21–55 had a job in 2000. That number was under 77 percent in 2015. A 7.5 percentage point decline in employment rates is a massive change relative to historical levels.’ Hurst then narrows his focus to younger, low-skilled men. He notes that 72 percent of low-skilled men in their 20s had a job in 2015, ten percentage points lower than in 2000, when 82 percent of low-skilled men in their 20s had a job, a change that Hurst calls ‘staggering.’

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So what are these men doing with their time? How are they getting by?

Seeking an explanation, he dismisses ‘a rise in school attendance for this age group’ as a possible cause. ‘That is not the case,’ he says. He notes that a fifth of men in their 20s had not worked at all during the prior 12 months, compared to ‘a little under 10 percent’ in 2000. This is historically anomalous, as ‘[m]en in their 20s historically are a group with a strong attachment to the labor force.’ The decline was ‘larger than it was for all other sex, age, and skill groups during this same time period.’ So what are these men doing with their time? How are they getting by? Hurst argues that men in their 20s, especially those with lower skills (less than a college education), are living in their parents’ basement playing video games.

According to recent data, 51 percent of lower-skilled men in their 20s live with a parent or close relative. That number was only 35 percent in 2000. In 2014, 70 percent of lower-skilled men in their 20s without a job lived with a parent or close relative.

Citing data from time use diaries produced by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Hurst demonstrates how much time men devote to leisure activities, including video games.

The average young, lower-skilled, non-employed man in 2014 spent about two hours per day on video games. That is the average. Twenty-five percent reported playing at least three hours per day. About 10 percent reported playing for six hours per day. The life of these nonworking, lower-skilled young men looks like what my son wishes his life was like now: not in school, not at work, and lots of video games.

Hurst goes on to cite data that these men are happier than they were in 2000, given the availability of relatively cheap technological diversions like smartphones, social media, and video games. This is a short-term effect, however, as they will eventually enter their 30s and 40s, when they might start families but not have the skills and experience to succeed in the labor market and earn the bread to support their families. This can lead to larger social ills such as alcohol abuse, suicide, drug use, and increases in public assistance budgets, problems which, as noted by the CEA report in briefly discussing some of the effects of unemployment, already afflict many lower-skilled men who are unemployed. Which leads us back to my original point.

Work is an essential part of life and a basic foundation of any social order.

It keeps people sane. The decline in prime-age male labor force participation over the last sixty years is thus a destabilizing trend. It is, of course, still true that a large majority of men remain in the labor force. The apocalypse is not approaching. But the significance of the decline, and the accompanying phenomena of technological innovation and globalization, must be taken into account by policymakers concerned about the socioeconomic stability of the future. Perhaps they may provide some degree of accounting for the closest thing we have to a modern-age apocalypse: the election of Donald Trump, who has captured the hearts of lower-skilled white men by panning the forces of globalization and immigration and other putative causes of a loss in employment for lower-skilled men, to the presidency.

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