President BidenJoe BidenPublicist ‘not associated’ with Kanye West at time of election incident: spokesperson Trump teases 2024 run during Orlando event with O’Reilly Facebook exec says ‘people,’ not platform, to blame for vaccine misinformation MORE and his media allies are wrongly celebrating the recent drop in the unemployment rate to 4.2 percent as a vindication of his leadership. “Because of the extraordinary strides we’ve made, we can look forward to a brighter, happier new year ahead,” Biden claimed earlier this month.
Yet this topline unemployment rate obscures the fact that millions of Americans have not returned to work since the COVID-19 pandemic began. The true labor market picture gets clearer when examining the labor force participation rate (LFPR), which is the share of U.S. adults working or looking for work. In contrast, the unemployment rate doesn’t account for those who have dropped out of the labor force.
There are still 4 million fewer people working today and nearly 5 million more people out of the labor force compared to February 2020. Biden repeatedly claims that he has presided over a record number of new jobs, but in reality he’s only been able to return a fraction of the jobs lost during the pandemic. President Biden and congressional Democrats’ nearly $5 trillion “Build Back Broke” legislation, currently pending before the Senate, would exacerbate this depressed labor force by expanding and implementing an array of social welfare programs that make it attractive not to work. This reckless spending would also spur more painful inflation, which the Bureau of Labor Statistics announced Friday is already at a 39-year high.
After falling precipitously from 66 to 63 percent under President ObamaBarack Hussein ObamaTrump teases 2024 run during Orlando event with O’Reilly Biden is losing contest of wills with Iran over nukes From the Cold War to a hard freeze MORE, the LFPR actually rose slightly under President TrumpDonald TrumpPublicist ‘not associated’ with Kanye West at time of election incident: spokesperson Trump teases 2024 run during Orlando event with O’Reilly Jan. 6 panel details case for holding Meadows in contempt ahead of House vote MORE before the pandemic hit — a remarkable achievement given its long-run decline. Today, the LFPR, including among 25- to 54-year-olds, has gained back only about half of its pandemic-related decline.
Making this low LFPR even more striking is the fact that America is enduring a historic labor shortage. The Labor Department announced recently that there are a record 11 million unfilled jobs nationwide — suggesting that some Americans on the labor market sidelines are actively choosing not to work.
Generous social welfare programs are contributing to the low LFPR by making it attractive not to work. Ordinary Americans — many of them vaccinated against COVID-19…
Read More: Build Back Better bill would further depress US labor force participation