From 2000 to 2018, the labor force participation rate of 16- to 64-year-olds fell 3.6 percentage points. In previous work , we have shown that declining labor force participation among young people contributed substantially to this decline. In this analysis, we describe how teenagers (16–19-year-olds) have shifted away from working or seeking work and the impact this shift has had on the aggregate labor force participation rate.

While declining summer employment is part of the story, the bulk of the teenage reduction in labor force participation comes from fewer teenagers being jointly enrolled in school and participating in the labor force during the academic year. We find that—despite the low teen share of the working-age population (8 percent)—if teens had still participated in the labor force at their 2000 rates, aggregate 16–64-year-old participation would be more than 1.3 percentage points higher.

School is not out for the summer

It is striking how the labor market behavior of teens deviates from that of other age groups. The teen labor force participation rate reached an all-time peak in 1979 (57.9 percent) and gradually declined until about 2000, when it then dropped precipitously to a 2010–18 plateau of about 35 percent (figure 1). While the participation rate of prime-age workers (25- to 54-year-olds) has edged down since its peak in the late 1990s and older workers’ (55- to 64-year-olds) participation has increased, the scale of the shift in teen participation dwarfs these other changes.

The annualized labor force participation rates shown in figure 1 obscure how different labor force participation is for teenagers during the summer and academic year. In this analysis, we use data from the Current Population Survey to separate academic year and summer teen labor force participation trends. Within the academic year and summer, we show how labor force participation and school enrollment have changed over time (figures 2a and 2b).

Most teenagers are compelled to be in school during the academic year, but may or may not work at the same time. Figure 2a depicts the decline in teenagers’ academic year (September to May) labor force participation. From 2000 to 2018, the share of teenagers working or seeking work while enrolled in school declined by 11.4 percentage points and the share of teenagers who are only working or seeking work decreased by 4.6 percentage points from 2000 to 2018, amounting to a total decline in teen labor force participation of 15.9 percentage points.