Demographic Breakdown of Unemployment and Non Labor Force Workers in the Nation

The Department of Labor estimates that by the year 2012, the Labor Force will be over age 55 (Harvey 184). In a time when issues such as Age and Ability are at the far front for a lot of employers, understanding how to deal with an aging workforce is essential. The debate on how to address this issue is only beginning.

Ageism is prejudice or discrimination on the basis of a person’s age. According to the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), 7 million people were unemployed mid-year 2017, with 1.2 million of those people being fifty-five years of age or older. This older population plus the new graduates entering the workforce place the unemployment rate at about 4.4 percent.

Unemployment has extremely negative effects on many people and businesses. The government budgets funds for unemployment benefits and when the unemployment rate rises, the government has to re-allocate funds to accommodate

In 2015 Moody and Sasser reported: “For society, the decline in labor force participation represents a loss of productivity by older people - a group that, on average, is now living longer, is better educated, and is in better health than ever before’” (p. 391).

This is the age range that has almost entirely finished their educational requirements and is not yet retiring (Soergel, 2015). As you can see in the graph shown in figure 1, the participation has started to decline more since 2010 than in any other year. Economists generally expect the labor force participation rate to continue its gradual decline as more “baby boomers” retire. And, as more young adults choose to further their education, instead of entering the workforce. “These trends inherently are causing the U.S. to fall short of its output potential, which is why many economists consider labor force participation to be a measure of slack in the domestic labor market (Soergel,

The aging of the U.S. population is affecting the demographics of the work force. Between 2000 and 2010, the age group experiencing the greatest growth will be those aged 55-64; by 2005, people aged 55 and over are projected to be nearly 20% of the working age population, compared to 12.5% in 1990 (Barber, Crouch, and Merker 1992; Barth, McNaught, and Rizzi 1993). For a number of reasons, including financial need, longer life expectancy, and a desire to continue working, the number of individuals aged 55 and over in the work force is continuing to grow (Hall and Mirvis 1994). It is no longer unusual for individuals to retire from one job, begin drawing a pension, and seek new employment: since 1984, both the full- and

Economists believe that structural unemployment is excluded—perhaps permanently—from the labor market. If adjust official data include men in prison or the armed forces (who are left out of the raw numbers), around 35% of 25- to 54-year-old men with no high-school diploma have no job, up from around 10% in the 1960s. Of those who finished high school but did not go to college, the fraction without work has climbed from below 5% in the 1960s to almost 25%.Among blacks, more than 30% overall and almost 70% of high-school dropouts have no job.

The age issue has been an ongoing argument between both employers and job seekers. More and more senior workers sense that their ages are being held against them; they feel increasingly uneasy by the job market that fails to seek their true abilities. Furthermore, as the baby boom generation gradually shifting towards the retirement age, the demographic of the people in the labor force is changing. In the near future, these baby boomers would eventually has to exit the market force and leave many jobs open to be filled. Specific related issues have been considered, including the decline in human capital, lost skills, etc. With fewer people from the younger ages are involve

Women aged 65 and over, on the other hand, had rather limited labor force attachment to

The unemployment rate in the United States of America is a topic that is often scrutinized and discussed among economists, politicians and fellow citizens. Frequently newscasters are advertising monthly unemployment rate, and I ask myself this question: Is the rate being published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) actually the true figure, or is the real number being misrepresented? In effort to answer this question, one has to understand the breakdown of the U.S. population as it relates to the actual labor force. One also has to comprehend who the government considers to be unemployed. I will be analyzing the current statistical numbers provided by the BLS, as well providing a detailed analysis of the government’s perspective as to what is deemed to be employed and unemployed.

For these unemployment rate issues, the US economy had given the solution, which is creating more job spaces. That resulted the unemployment seems to shrink. Nonetheless, this solution couldn’t achieve to be the reliable solution. According to Lindsey Piegza, “The decline in the unemployment rate was the result of hundreds of thousands of Americans dropping out of the labor force rather than finding gainful employment” (Soergel), which clearly explains that hundreds or thousands of jobs did not contribute to the reduction of the unemployment rate even though there was a support from the U.S economy. In addition to, despite the fact that creating new jobs could give a chance to the unemployed people, it doesn’t mean for the entire number of unemployed individuals. Opportunities are given more for the higher income households or advantageous individuals. Also, large number of jobs do not matter to the people who are not even interested in the particular jobs. Even though U.S economy provided plenty of jobs, it did not help to abate the unemployment rate. As a result, it couldn’t be a real solution for the unemployment issue.

In years past the older generation was thought of being less productive, surveys provide the evidence that puts this in perspective Within their data one can find the importance of the older workforce when it comes to the labor market. It is relevant to note that compared to the years past the older workforce of today is well educated. Looking at their higher earnings and retiring later this can be seen as the explanation for this fact. It has also been proven that a more productive worker will remain in the labor force longer than those who are not as industrious. There has been little evidence that those considered as members of the aging workforce have hurt productivity.

In the year 2000, persons over age 65 included 35 million and by 2020 this age group is projected to reach 54 million (“The impact of,”). Furthermore, as stated in an article written for the Ivey Business Journal, the American Association of Retired Persons projects that of these “baby boomers,” eighty percent can be expected to continue working (Christensen, Pitt-Catsouphes 2005).

Mature economies are at a unique point in history—
the working age population (people aged 15 to 64) is declining,

Older people more likely having the need to support a family and self-subsistence meaning that they must seek employment to fulfil these needs.