Cheers, COTTonLINE readers. Have a happy Labor Day, a final enjoyment of frivolous summer before we segue into the seriousness of autumn.
I am having trouble shaking a sense of irony in honoring labor, as our nation experiences increasing numbers of adults in the key 25 - 55 age demographic who neither work nor look for work, who have basically given up engaging in labor. The last time numbers working were this low was before large numbers of married women joined the labor force back in the 70s.
Part of the backstory to low levels of workforce participation may be an unintended consequence of the high levels of incarceration we've experienced as a society. Former inmates find employment difficult to achieve, as time inside is hardly an asset in the eyes of potential employers.
We've also made disability benefits too easy to get. I'll bet the record shows once a person qualifies for disability they rarely "get over it" and go back to work. Instead they squirm around until they find a bearable way to live on reduced means and there they stay, essentially until death or social security kicks in.
I've got to think high levels of illegal immigration - mostly of low skill, uneducated individuals who become the docile laborers preferred by employers - is also a factor. It has contributed to the widespread "giving up" of low-qualifications citizens whose jobs immigrants have usurped.
