
Education and Men without Work - mighty-fine
https://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/education-and-men-without-work
======
tathougies
The article is long on detail and short on suggestions (which is
understandable). However, the suggestions it does make are not obviously going
to work. The men illustrated in the article do not seem incapable of work, but
rather disinterested. Vocational training isn't going to fix the fact that the
government benefits the article cited allows the men to stay at home playing
video games all day. Most people (but especially men, given the propensity of
the male psyche to become dependent on dopamine) would rather take the short
term thrill of continuous dopamine hits provided by video games than working
to make a living.

Who can really blame them? For the vast majority of history, the main impetus
for men to seek status of any kind is to impress women and provide a legacy
for families. As the article mentions, men who are cut off from each of these
simply stop participating in the kinds of behavior that make modern society
possible. Enabled by the preponderance of easily accessible government money,
drugs, etc, these men, lacking any legacy or dependents to speak of, would
rather bide their time hedonistically. Some, realizing their situation, choose
not to bide their time at all (look at the rise of middle aged male suicides).

Unfortunately, the two causes the article cites (dissolution of family
structure and rise of single male households) are unaddressed. This is
understandable as even mentioning these problems in high society today would
be frowned upon. The article admits this, but, the writer, being part of the
same society he's criticizing, falls into the same trap.

~~~
Mirioron
I don't think the two causes listed in the article are actually the causes. I
think both are yet another symptom of an underlying problem. I would argue
that men doing worse in schooling is likely another symptom of the same issue.

I think that the heart of the issue is that more men nowadays feel that they
just don't matter. Not to society nor to anyone else. This leads to a
situation where they will simply sacrifice less and try to enjoy more.

So why would men feel that way?

My initial thoughts were that perhaps it is due to the recent demonization of
men and the removal of some of their privileges, while the burdens (selective
service, unfair family court) remained. While I think that these could be
contributing (accelerating) factors, I don't think this is at the heart of the
matter. We see similar trends in other countries, where lots of (young) men
are essentially checking out from society. Japan is an example of a country
where this problem has likely progressed further than in the US. My initial
thoughts don't fit, because they couldn't explain why this same process would
happen in countries with a pretty different culture from the US.

I'm stumped. Perhaps it's somehow linked to the falling testosterone levels in
men that we have observed?

~~~
state_less
What jobs still benefit from a man's physical strength anymore? Most things
that need serious brawn use 'hydraulic muscles'? Soon women won't even ask us
to twist the lid off jars anymore, there will be an iRobot for that. Where are
men needed these days?

We automated away manliness. It's worth less these days. The least valued men
are now valued even less. Frankly, I think these disaffected men should go
back to the countryside where it's still relatively cheap and grown their own
food and drugs. It's not economical to grow your own calories the old
fashioned way, but neither is collecting welfare. And it'd be a heck of a lot
gentler on the psyche to create something with your own hands. I remember
Richard Feynman talking about researching topics that already had been written
about just for the joy of discovery. It wasn't needed, but was done
recreationally.

~~~
erikpukinskis
Landscaper. Arborist. Construction. Orthopedist. Orderly. Bouncer. Soldier.
Sailor.

~~~
thisisnico
Agreed. The entire construction and trade industry is huge and these people
get paid ridiculous money because nobody wants to do these jobs. These are
pretty manly jobs imo.

~~~
blaser-waffle
Construction and trades get paid ridiculous money because no one wants to do
those jobs? Bollocks they do. Have you actually spent any time doing any of
these things?

Most of the jobs that nobody wants are outsourced to illegal immigrant labor
-- the housing boom of the 2000's was built on their backs and their hard
word.

Most of the tradies are pulling $50-80k USD, and that's a lot of hard work.
That's good money if you're 20 year old, but a Network Engineer with a CCNA,
some kinda degree, and 5 years experience will pull $105k USD in a big US
city, all while at an air-conditioned desk. And those are the well paid
tradesworkers; basic labor and less in demand trades often pays like shit, and
doesn't provide benefits.

I ain't saying you can't make good money doing it -- I knew a carpenter who
was like #1 ranked on Angie's List and pulled well north of 6 figures -- but
those are the exceptions.

------
tmux314
There's a very weird "let them eat cake" attitude in this thread which I find
distressing. The study reports on the millions of working age men in the US
who are essentially too depressed and face too many obstacles to search for
work. Instead, they're spending their days staying inside, getting high, and
playing video games. They essentially have little to no chance to pursue
romantic relationships. Many of them eventually take their own lives.

Perhaps some are enjoying their "hedonistic" lifestyles, but likely most have
totally given up on life, much like the Japanese hikikomori. It's not healthy
mentally or physically. But it seems like as long as people treat these men as
"losers" who deserve their fate, the more this problem will grow.

~~~
lidHanteyk
To give my perspective: I'm a cake-eater. I have a dayjob, but I don't really
care about it beyond basic professionalism, and I spend a fair amount of my
spare time with cannabis and video games rather than with people.

Who cares if my male peers think I'm a loser? Most of them are incompetent
mooching pieces of shit, and I don't have to believe in their crab mentality.
They can say "loser" all they like.

Who cares if my female peers think I'm a loser? I've gotten laid enough in
life, and it's not like job sites are dating sites. I already dodged the
bullet of having to raise somebody else's kid or having to be stuck in a
loveless marriage, which makes me not-a-loser in my book.

~~~
tathougies
Youre right you have dodged a bullet in not having to raise another mans child
or being in a loveless marriage. However, societally speaking, there is an
alternative.. Good enough marriages where men raise their own children.

------
TomMckenny
Benefits are much more generous and much easier to get in countries with much
higher worker participation. And they have the same video games in other
countries too.

And marriage does not cause entry in the workforce, participation in the
workforce is what makes marriage partners more interested.

Reduction in benefits has not and is no increasing work participation. There
was not spike in worker participation in the 90s when massive "reform" was
undertaken. There is no increased work force participation from the cut backs
being done now or in recent years. Yet loosening of work safety regulations
would certainly be expected to increase disabilities for manual laborers. So
the best conclusion is that the supposed cheaters aren't.

Also, if those not participating in the work force are merely enjoying life on
theses supposed benefits, one would not expect the already high and ever
increasing suicide rate in this sector.

The author's ideology entails denying calls for higher wages by diverting what
is clearly a demand/wage problem[1] into a culture war issue.

[1] I'm guessing the author is a fan of Adam Smith where lack of participation
is _always_ caused by under pricing. Apparently the author is willing to
accept pretty thin evidence to drop Smith when that theory might benefit
labor.

~~~
Spooky23
Welfare reform was always bullshit. It was a compromise where the Democrats
got some added benefits and changes, and the Republicans got the ability to
cut off traditional welfare and transition people to Social Security
Disability

This pushed the costs off the states’ books and the federal budget, and made
the costs a problem for social security. It backfired as it created a
permanent underclass and drove up Medicaid utilization and costs.

~~~
speedplane
> Welfare reform was always bullshit. ... This pushed the costs off the
> states’ books and the federal budget, and made the costs a problem for
> social security. It backfired as it created a permanent underclass and drove
> up Medicaid utilization and costs.

I'm not entirely sure this is a bad result. Driving down welfare costs may
indeed drive up medicaid costs, but this seems like a decent trade. Rather
than giving people a check, give them health insurance and support for them to
get their own job.

Give people the minimum necessary to keep their dignity (basic housing, public
education, foodstamps, basic healthcare), and if they want more give them
opportunities to grab it.

~~~
Spooky23
I was unclear. A local administrative law judge makes a determination that you
are "disabled", you are placed on SSDI and _cannot_ work without losing it.

~~~
speedplane
> A local administrative law judge makes a determination that you are
> "disabled", you are placed on SSDI and cannot work without losing it.

It's not easy to get SSDI, it requires many requests, hearings before judges,
and lots of forms. However, I agree that once you get it, you're basically
trapped within it. There's definitely room for improvement (e.g., if you have
SSDI and a job, some progressively increasing percentage of your income is
subtracted from your SSDI benefits).

------
CptFribble
I don't see why this is such a surprise, most people hate working.

I thought it was almost a truism that people work for retirement, i.e. the
point in their life when they have enough saved to stop working and just relax
and travel or fish or whatever.

If there's a way to skip 30 years of working at a job you hate and just start
now, most people would take that option.

This is the basic problem with basic income, although I still think it's
important and necessary, we're going to have to undertake a huge cultural
shift and accept a large XX% of the populace just sitting around, vaping and
playing video games all day. Not everyone is built to seek out the constant
struggle of self-improvement.

~~~
xyzzyz
_we 're going to have to undertake a huge cultural shift and accept a large
XX% of the populace just sitting around, vaping and playing video games all
day_

I don't think most people care too much about that. Unlike communist states
which forced people to work, even if the job was bullshit, this is a free
country, and if someone wants to sit around doing nothing useful all day, they
are perfectly welcome to do so.

What the people do care about though is when the government takes their money
that they earned through their work and gives it to people who sit all day
vaping and playing video games, so that they can keep enjoying their leisurely
lifestyle. This is blatant unfairness, being punished for working and rewarded
for not working.

~~~
gknoy
> I don't think most people care too much about that

I feel like a LOT of people care strongly about this. Almost all of our
national dialogue about immigrants, taxpayer-funded healthcare, etc, is
centered around how unfair it is for Other People to get Free Stuff.

The idea that we could _build housing and give it to homeless people_, or just
pay for everyone's basic healthcare needs (even if you could still get better
by paying more), raises the ire of a significant portion of the population
here. Our country is in love with the idea that if you fail, it was because
you made mistakes, and _deserve to be punished_ for them. (Never mind that
often times, people go bankrupt because of unplanned medical issues, etc.)

~~~
xyzzyz
> The idea that we could _build housing and give it to homeless people_, or
> just pay for everyone's basic healthcare needs (even if you could still get
> better by paying more), raises the ire of a significant portion of the
> population here.

Does that surprise you that people who earned their own houses and their own
healthcare through their own work resent the idea of skimming some of the
fruits of their labor and giving them to people who didn't do so?

Look, this thread started with suggestion that "we're going to have to
undertake a huge cultural shift and accept a large XX% of the populace just
sitting around, vaping and playing video games all day". I don't like this
bait and switch, where first I'm forced to support people who just want to
live life of leisure, and when I complain about that, I get slandered by
suggestions that I want to _punish_ unlucky chaps with medical bankruptcies.

~~~
shard
As I understand it, it is a matter of looking at the total picture instead of
just the free house. I don't have specific numbers, but I recall an article I
read several years ago which was talking about costs that are incurred by a
homeless person, covering such services such as police, hospitals, etc, and
concluded that the costs were way higher than giving the homeless person a
house. Therefore, the reason to give a homeless person a house is not
motivated by just altruism, but actually also from saving taxpayer money. It's
a similar concept to making sure the poor have good healthcare, so that the
spread of diseases are contained.

~~~
xyzzyz
> I don't have specific numbers, but I recall an article I read several years
> ago which was talking about costs that are incurred by a homeless person,
> covering such services such as police, hospitals, etc, and concluded that
> the costs were way higher than giving the homeless person a house.
> Therefore, the reason to give a homeless person a house is not motivated by
> just altruism, but actually also from saving taxpayer money.

This assumes that the world is steady state, and that government policies
don't create any incentives to change behavior. Sure, it might be cheaper, all
else being equal, but such program would not make all else equal. You'd get
more people who otherwise wouldn't be homeless, but the free house for
homeless program made them decide that it's worth it to become one. As a
result, you'd have many more homeless people than before, and so your free
house for the homeless program quickly becomes very expensive. Indeed, you
need to look at the total picture, instead of just the free house.

------
Merrill
This story really needs another graph showing "NOT-IN-LABOR FORCE RATES FOR
WOMEN AGES 25-54; 1965 TO 2019".

See [https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2016/images/hipple-
fig6.png](https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2016/images/hipple-fig6.png)

It appears that the non-participation rate for women is about twice as high as
for men.

~~~
scarejunba
So the current prevailing theory is that the guys are getting high and playing
video games? What's the current prevailing theory for the girls? Doing
unformalized work that doesn't show up in the stats? Also playing games and
doing drugs?

~~~
Erik816
Look at the chart. There are now a lot more women in the labor force than
there were in the 1940s. Back then, they were staying home with the kids. Now,
women are having children later and often working (at least part time) once
they have them.

~~~
scarejunba
Sure, I'm talking about the 25% of women and what the theory is for them
that's analogous to the 10% of men that aren't working.

------
TurkishPoptart
>Even after controlling for age, ethnicity, and education, married men are
decidedly more likely to be in the workforce than men who have never married.
This "marriage effect" is so powerful that married prime-age male high-school
dropouts generate labor-force participation rates in the same league as their
never-married, college-graduate peers. Analogous but somewhat less powerful
effects are seen when we drill deeper into family life: Irrespective of
marital status, education, and ethnicity, a prime-age man is more likely to be
in the workforce if he lives in the same home as children under the age of 18,
regardless of his race or education.

This is pretty damn interesting but not all that surprising. For those whom
the institution of marriage is still relevant (and those lucky enough to find
a partner), getting up and going to work everyday is not a huge problem.

~~~
freepor
Yeah, most men work because people depend on them. I don't like my job but I
show up at work because what the hell else would I do? I have two kids who
need food and a roof over their head.

~~~
ntsplnkv2
Isn't this why most people (incl. women) work? We work because we want to pay
for food/water/shelter. Then past that we work for things that we want.

~~~
freepor
I mean clearly some people work for other reasons. Tom Brady still wants to
play football at age 43 after achieving enough for two separate Hall of Fame
careers. Meg Whitman is CEO of a new company even though her net worth is over
$5 billion. They are doing it for other reasons.

~~~
ntsplnkv2
Yes, that is why I said "past that, we do it for things we want."

In those cases, they are doing it for things they want to do. My point is it's
not just a male phenomenon.

------
Miner49er
> but they nevertheless suggest that changes in family structure had a
> powerful and adverse impact on male work rates and labor-force participation
> rates...

This article seems to assume that changes in family structures are a _cause_
of men not working. I see no mention that it could actually be an _effect_ of
that. Who's gonna want to marry (let alone have kids with) a man who is
unemployed and isn't even looking for work?

~~~
ameister14
>Needless to say, the relationship between family structure and prime-age male
labor-force participation is complex, with causation arrows pointing both
ways. Yet on balance, the net effect of such changes appears to have been a
withdrawal of male labor from the workforce — a "supply-side effect," and a
major one.

------
okareaman
My impression is that young people are just catching up with Bucky:

“We should do away with the absolutely specious notion that everybody has to
earn a living. It is a fact today that one in ten thousand of us can make a
technological breakthrough capable of supporting all the rest. The youth of
today are absolutely right in recognizing this nonsense of earning a living.
We keep inventing jobs because of this false idea that everybody has to be
employed at some kind of drudgery because, according to Malthusian Darwinian
theory he must justify his right to exist. So we have inspectors of inspectors
and people making instruments for inspectors to inspect inspectors. The true
business of people should be to go back to school and think about whatever it
was they were thinking about before somebody came along and told them they had
to earn a living.”

― Buckminster Fuller

------
jka
Something to highlight in this article is the prevalence of pain medication
use among the out-of-work population:

"Apart from the small fraction (around 13% in 2015) of prime-age male non-
workers who are adult students, the remainder report spending many of their
waking hours watching and playing on screens — over 2,000 hours per year on
average. Almost half of these non-working men report taking pain medication on
any given day (which should raise a red flag for those worried about the
opioid crisis)"

The watching and playing on screens isn't ideal (2000h/y == 40h/wk _on
average_ \-- which doesn't seem to leave a ton of room for a base level of
healthy exercise and socialization) - but at least it is relatively harmless.

But that _half_ of these folks would take pain medication on a daily basis
seems staggering.

The author seems to correlate this abuse with the availability of opioids via
Medical and Medicare. That does seem like a problem. However, reading further
into the blog of the quoted author[0], that writer (who visited many affected
areas during their research) attributes it to the private sector pushing
opioids heavily.

Personally it seems fairer to attribute most of the cause to the private
industry which made the painkillers popular and mainstream, as opposed to
Medicare and Medicaid, which functioning as desired should be making all
healthcare more accessible (with the unfortunate inclusion of opioids as a
dangerous subset of that).

[0] - [http://samquinones.com/reporters-blog/2016/11/21/donald-
trum...](http://samquinones.com/reporters-blog/2016/11/21/donald-trump-
opiates-america/)

------
aazaa
> According to the latest monthly jobs report from the Bureau of Labor
> Statistics, "work rates" for American men in October 2019 stood very close
> to their 1939 levels, as reported in the 1940 U.S. Census. Despite some
> improvement since the end of the Great Recession, Great Depression-style
> work rates are still characteristic today for the American male, both for
> those of "prime working age" (defined as ages 25 to 54) and for the broader
> 20 to 64 group.

The premise of this article is based on this statistic. Oddly enough, no
definition of "work rate" is given. After some quick searching, I didn't find
anything accessible, either.

This may be significant. Is a full-time "investor" included in the count? What
about a programmer working on a startup? What about some other kind of self-
employed contractor?

There are many ways a person might not show up in a tally called "work rate."
Many (all?) of them have become a lot easier to pull off over the last 20
years.

~~~
alfromspace
Labor force participation rate. It says in the article.

~~~
aazaa
Sure, but how is that measured and what does it exclude?

~~~
sdinsn
participation rate = (employed + actively seeking work population) / (non-
prison population of age 16-64)

------
wayoutthere
I think male socialization has left many men poorly-equipped to deal with the
modern workplace. Prior to the information age, the primary challenges in the
workplace were physical or motivational. So an attitude of "be tough and work
through the hard times" was effective and allowed you to earn a living.
Boorish behavior was tolerated or even celebrated as "male bonding". But as
women entered more professions, that behavior became divisive.

In the modern workplace, the primary challenges are emotional, and I don't
think a lot of men have the tools to deal with them. Many men never had to
learn how to deal with anxiety, fear, uncertainty or anger. Bad behavior from
men was tolerated or even celebrated until recently. What worked to get them
where they are is no longer appropriate going forward. So it's no wonder more
men are opting out of work altogether because they feel they are in a no-win
situation. You see a lot of this in "incel" communities where many self-
deprecatingly refer to themselves as "neets" (no employment, education or
training).

To be clear here, I'm not blaming men as this is a societal problem. It does
not affect all or even most men. This is part of the "toxic" aspect of "toxic
masculinity" \-- it harms men just as much as it harms women, only in
different ways. It is possible to undo, but it takes years of therapy and a
commitment to "be better" in the face of misleading signals that say you don't
have to change / compromise.

~~~
at_a_remove
_What_ male socialization?

Who are our teachers in the United States? Over three-quarters are women, less
than a quarter men. And given that recent studies indicate that women teachers
tend to rate boys (unfairly) lower than girls for the same performance, that's
women's socialization teaching boys how to behave in schools.

Societally? Go on, search to see what doodles Google made for Father's Day.

Which parent seems to have the final say in the courts? Again, we seem to
default to Mother Knows Best.

What about relationships? US society seems to have ceded the ground entirely
to Venus. So very, very many "men are stupid" posts on Twitter and it does not
seem to have an end in sight.

Men's clubs? Legislated away wherever possible, on the grounds that it granted
men an unfair business advantage. Meanwhile, an organization set up for women
in business and creating a co-working space for them had members complain that
men are showing up, with a startling lack of self-awareness.

Perhaps this is female socialization not working for boys and men.

~~~
wayoutthere
Not sure you really understand my point; "male socialization" is simply "the
way we raise boys" \-- which includes the ways we as a society neglect their
needs.

This isn't a "men versus women" thing, but rather a "we need to pay better
attention to boys' emotional needs" thing. When you don't, you teach them that
their emotions don't matter and aren't a thing they need to manage to have a
healthy, happy life.

~~~
at_a_remove
I'm not sure you understand _my_ point: the way we raise boys has largely been
ceded to women for a while now and heaping "toxic masculinity" (really, when
was the last time you saw the second word without the first tugging it along?)
shaming on men is just more of the same.

We need less of it.

------
belorn
There is a large double standard applied here that a man who don't work is
checking out of society, but a woman who does the same is a productive citizen
since she can produce babies.

We wanted and most of us still want equality in the work force with both women
and men equality responsible to earn their place in society. The bread winner
model is cultural obsolete, even through we still behave, and given many
comments here on HN, still think in those terms. A mans role culturally remain
to support his children and their mother. If he doesn't do this then we
declare them as checking out from society, become hikikomori, an drug addict
and hedonistically waster of time. Increased rates of depression and suicides
only reinforce our belief that men must fulfill their role or they will only
harm themselves and others.

So let me make a suggestion. Maybe it is time to change the culture.

------
dx87
It's interesting to see the contrast in discussion with other posts that talk
about how we need to get rid of useless jobs. Those posts normally talk about
how we need to make it so it's possible to just live off government benefits
instead of spending our lives working, meanwhile this submission calls it a
national crisis when men are leaving the workforce and choosing to live off of
government benefits. I don't think people choosing to leave the workforce is
necessarily a bad thing, but there should be a way for them to find a sense of
purpose or community, if that's what they desire.

~~~
non-entity
I'm not going to go into detail because it will inevitably lead to a pointless
flame war, but HN seems to flip flop politically between threads that deal
with primary economic issues and threads that have more of a social focus

------
durnygbur
Talking from the perspective of an EU country, the salary deductions on
employment contract for a single person are brutal and exceeding 40% of the
gross salary, while public institutions treat young single native male as
their worst enemy. Enormous successes simply don't happen over here, no point
engaging in a startup and risking the mental health. The dating market is...
well enough was said already by now. Once achieving housing and certain
financial comfort, why should one bother with employment?

------
supernova87a
As unpopular it may be to say such a politically incorrect thing (admitting
this is a generalization, and all the caveats that come with it) --

Men generally have the biological need to go _do_ and _wander_ and _discover_
things. I don't know whether it's hormones or what. Debate all you like
elsewhere (I'm not trying to debate that point here).

My point is that when they don't get an outlet to do this, they cause trouble.
Idle hands are the tools of the devil. They get in trouble, they cause
trouble. They create things, but also get into trouble.

And a society that doesn't provide outlets for working-aged males to go out
and do things is inviting trouble.

What I observe about the US is that we are making the cost of employing people
so high that we have no incremental way to put people at the low end of the
skills ladder (or at the high end of aging out) to even minimal use -- and the
only way to get even a low level purpose in life is to be employed by a
company that goes through very constrained legal and regulatory calculus to
employ someone.

In other countries, people who are unemployed can:

\-- Be community volunteers next to government workers to augment local
capabilities

\-- Be ticket takers on buses, trains

\-- Be part time informal labor / delivery people

\-- Be "shop minders" who aren't fully employees but help when needed

All these things for even a paltry wage, but purpose in life. In other
countries, you notice immediately the presence of such people.

But we in the US have foreclosed the ability for people to fill these roles. I
guess the last time we did this was with the WPA. The very rules we have in
place to protect people (and claimed benefit of workplace standards, etc)
prevent many at the bottom from being useful.

It's to our societal peril, as we can see lately.

~~~
wccrawford
"Men generally have the biological need to go do and wander and discover
things."

I see no evidence that this is a male thing, versus a female thing, or even
that all men feel this. I see plenty of men who just coast through life with
no curiosity or drive. They don't explore or discover, they just consume and
do what they're told so they can consume some more.

~~~
bnjms
> I see no evidence that this is a male thing, versus a female thing

I’ve yet to see a valid generalization for men that did not hold for women.
Though sometimes the perspective changes.

------
ahoy
National Affairs is a publication of the American Enterprise Institute, a
conservative think tank. It's important to keep in mind their ideology when
reading anything they publish.

------
freepor
I thought that government benefits in the US were shite? I can understand why
European men might opt-out but I thought that you were basically dooming
yourself to homelessness without a job in America. How are these men living?

~~~
tathougies
Government benefits in the US are not shit, at all. They are very generous if
you qualify. The issue is qualifying, or lying to do so.

~~~
freepor
Hm, then I suspect that soon enough those benefits will go the way of the LL
Bean return policy.

~~~
kevingadd
Historically the benefits are either narrowed in eligibility or more
constraints are added. For example, while you can call federal disability
benefits "generous" there are lots of nasty constraints that make them awful
regardless - while your disability benefit may be "generous" you're forbidden
from having much in the way of savings and your "net worth" for that
calculation often includes things like a retirement account from work you did
while you were still healthy. (Yes, really)

Means-testing and carve-outs like that to catch "cheaters" are a common way to
eat away at benefits in the US, and politicians are actively adding more stuff
like that to food assistance and other programs currently. Means-testing is
especially effective here because a "reasonable" limit can be set with the
knowledge that the limit will cease to be reasonable after 5-25 years of
inflation and expense increases because lawmakers will never, ever raise the
limit.

------
bostonvaulter2
I can't help but think that we need a serious national discussion about this.
I feel that this issue is just going to get worse, because there simply aren't
enough well paying jobs to go around, especially on the lower end of the
skills market (remember that only ~1/3 of the US population graduated from
college).

In my opinion, this is why we need a president that understands and deeply
cares about this problem. This is why I am fully supporting Andrew Yang in his
presidential bid. He understands the state we're in and has accepted the
reality that all these jobs are not coming back and we need to start working
on solutions now. But please don't take my word for it and instead look into
him yourself, his Iowa Press interview is a great start:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DahyKQccudQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DahyKQccudQ)

------
rocqua
I've only skimmed the article, but nowhere does it seem to compare men to the
overall population. As it stands, these distressing trends could hold for
everyone, which makes the focus on men needless.

Did I miss something here? Does anyone know whether these trends are unique to
men? Because if (and that is a big if) this is not unique to men, that would
be some horrible cherry picking / manipulative statistics.

Regardless though, the data on unmarried non-immigrant men is really
disturbing. If it extends to unmarried non-immigrant women, that would harm
the narrative of the article, but still present a very big problem. In general
I would expect that married people have lower labour participation, because
there is a partner to pick up the slack. In general, living with two people
should be cheaper per person than living alone.

~~~
TristanDaCunha
I think the article takes as a given that men's labour participation is
tanking, while women's isn't. For most of the audience, this will be common
knowledge. Here is a graph about female participation:
[https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SL.TLF.CACT.FE.NE.ZS?lo...](https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SL.TLF.CACT.FE.NE.ZS?locations=US)

~~~
rocqua
But do we see the same disparity between immigration and marital status for
women? The issue raised here isn't (I think) that labour participation is
shifting away from men. It's that _men_ have some specific issues. If those
same issues are present in women, we need to have a different discussion.

~~~
TristanDaCunha
Okay, thanks for the clarification.

I do understand why the article hasn't touched upon this, since it's just an
attempt to diagnose the pattern seen in the overall male subpopulation, which
is not seen in the overall female subpopulation. But I agree it could be
interesting to look there too.

------
thrower123
This is the reality of what Basic Income will look like for most. It may still
be a net positive, for the fraction that has enough internal gumption to self-
direct into a fulfilling avenue - but many, many people will drink and drug
themselves to death idly.

------
throwaway55554
> Among economists and policy analysts who have examined these unsettling
> trends, the general consensus is that declining male workforce participation
> in modern America is mainly a structural, demand-driven problem — a matter
> of evaporating local jobs, and especially jobs requiring limited skills, in
> an increasingly dynamic and globalized marketplace.

Basically these are the men would have traditionally "built stuff"; factory
workers, etc.

We don't have any factories anymore.

>If this assessment is more or less correct, it would be hard to overstate the
importance of education and training as instruments for addressing our "men
without work" crisis.

How would that help? We don't have jobs for them. And the few that maybe could
find work, well, those jobs will soon enough be automated away.

> Third, there is America's curiously poor prime-age male labor-force
> participation-rate performance in comparison with other affluent never-
> communist democracies. Between 1965 and 2015, U.S. levels fell faster and
> sank lower than in any comparable country, with the exception of Italy
> (where official employment figures notoriously neglect "unofficial" work
> income). Yet America's race to the bottom in prime-age male labor-force
> participation is not readily explained by lackluster economic growth (which
> could also be called sluggish demand).

In America (USA) you ARE your job; it defines you. The American Way is to be
hard working and self sufficient. If you can't do that, there are tremendous
psychological effects. You can't blame these men for giving up.

We need to accept that this is the way forward and stop treating people who
don't work like leaches. We need to retrain society that there will be plenty
of able bodied people without work and society will need to take care of them.

~~~
leereeves
> We don't have any factories anymore.

Factories still exist, they're just in other countries.

And in China alone, they employ 100 million people.

~~~
jbay808
I don't think the parent meant otherwise. Or are you suggesting that Americans
looking for unskilled factory work can just move to China and get a job? Aside
from the cost and language barrier and family ties and other challenges of
relocating, I think legal barriers alone (visa issues, work permits) would
make that hard. It's already hard enough even for highly skilled professionals
to get work permits in another country.

~~~
leereeves
I just think it's important to properly identify the nature of the problem, so
we can try to solve it.

Many people assume that we don't have factories anymore because of automation,
but worldwide, manufacturing employment is still enormous. An import economy
is good in some ways, but it's bad for people who would like to have a factory
job.

~~~
jbay808
Ah... It was beyond my imagination that GGP would believe, or intend to imply,
that there's any shortage factory work to be found in China. But since you
find that you do meet people who actually believe that... Then all I can say
is I'm just very amazed!

~~~
leereeves
It's Andrew Yang's whole platform: automation is putting us all out of work.
But it's not true - China is putting Americans out of work, not automation.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/27/us/politics/andrew-
yang-a...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/27/us/politics/andrew-yang-
automation.html)

------
raydev
> Disability benefits are never lavish, but, together with eligibility for
> additional benefits unlocked by disability enrollment and with resources
> from family and friends, they can and clearly do provide the basis for a
> viable work-free existence for many millions of prime-working-age men today.

This really bugs me because I think the author has an opinion that is revealed
when they say "viable."

The focus is on the bare minimum benefits instead of the awful job prospects
for those at the bottom. Unlivable minimum wage paired with jobs that only
offer part-time employment, with wild, unpredictable shift schedules. No
health benefits or any notable discounts on food or clothing or anything.

These people live in areas where it's untenable to live without a car. So they
end up paying more in car maintenance to drive to a job that pays them less
and less.

Gov't benefits that disappear the moment they get a job, which put them in a
worse position than if they'd just stayed unemployed. Benefits they might need
to _pay_ back to the government.

Of course people opt out. Good for them. But don't for a moment think that
they're actually happy about this.

------
alex_young
This is a wonderful example of how to lie with statistics. Look at the first
graph [0].

Super scary up and to the right line that appears to show our labor force
being destroyed over time with no link to economic conditions.

But wait. Look at the scale. This data represents a 6% change over 50 years.

Very weak sauce. Why trust a paper that starts off by deceiving people in such
a base way?

[0]
[https://www.nationalaffairs.com/storage/app/media/Winter%202...](https://www.nationalaffairs.com/storage/app/media/Winter%202020/Eberstadt%20Charts-
Tables/xeberstadtchart1small.jpg.pagespeed.ic.24sadX9bfY.webp)

~~~
alex_young
Why the downvotes? It would be great to hear why my observation is incorrect
if you disagree.

------
mc32
>”The fall in participation for prime-age men has largely been concentrated
among those with a high school degree or less... …”

What would a high school diploma or 2 year college give them that would enable
them to get higher skilled jobs?

I’d be inclined to think that rather than needing “GE” (general Ed) they need
vocational type trading that focuses on making them skilled in a particular
area (no, not coding). That might have to be complemented with a few other
skills that allow them to integrate into the workforce (what it means to be
dependable, how to add value, etc., rather than “show up” which is half of it,
but not all of it).

~~~
Ididntdothis
“What would a high school diploma or 2 year college give them that would
enable them to get higher skilled jobs?”

When I look at programming jobs you pretty much need a college degree to even
get a company to talk to you. I wouldn’t be too surprised if there were other
jobs where having 2 years of college or a high school degree is required to be
even considered. There may be exceptions but in general there is a trend for
employers to require certain education levels if it makes sense or not.

~~~
wccrawford
I disagree. What you need to get your first programming job is some kind of
evidence that you will be able to do the job. That might be a piece of paper
from a college, but it could also be a portfolio, which is how many novice
programmers get started.

I actually believed what you're saying and paid for college for a couple
years. When I got my first job, it turns out they didn't even care about my
degree. All that mattered was that I was better than the other applicants. 1
applicant in particular had a much better resume, but I blew him out of the
water on a set of BrainBench tests that the company paid for.

At my current company, we mostly hire self-taught programmers because they're
consistently the ones that show the most promise.

Of course, at Google or Apple, this might be different, and the competition is
going to be much more fierce.

~~~
Ididntdothis
At the companies I have worked at or contracted with a college degree was the
minimum requirement to get a foot in the door. Not necessarily a computer
related degree. Any degree would do. It’s kind of silly but to me it seems a
fact of life. Thats why I recommend to get a college degree. You can live
without but life is much easier with.

~~~
wccrawford
I'm sure that's what they say, and for entry-level jobs it's probably mostly
true, even.

But I guarantee that if a mid-level developer with lots of experience applies
for a mid-level job, they'll look at them with or without a degree of any
kind. And they won't even care for senior-level.

Just about everything on the "requirements" list of a job posting is
negotiable. You just have to make up for it in some other way.

------
alexashka
It's just corporatocracy [0] and it's inevitable effects.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporatocracy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporatocracy)

~~~
pmarreck
[https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/when-to-use-
it...](https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/when-to-use-its-vs-its)

------
75dvtwin
I will make a guess for the causeses (that I stole from somebody smarter
Tucker Carlson [1]), and if they sound plausible, also will offer solutions.

a) The reason for "... Instead we have witnessed a mass exodus of men from the
workforce altogether. ..."

Is that man are looking for work that allows them to earn more than women,
that would likely (or like) to date.

Women are not likely to marry/create family with man that earns (or has less
earning potential) less than them.

Just as simple as that -- reasons may be deeply cultural, biological or
whatever... but I believe this is to be true.

Solution:

De-urbanization/ De-metropolization of work opportunities.

Basically more gov tech, fin tech, bio tech, and other 'high-margin' business
need to spread across a given country (UK, or US or whatever).

That spread will create a number of supporting job opportunities as well, that
will equalize the earning potential opportunities, lower cost of living
averages, create more 'geographically attractive cultural centers' and so on.

That (lowering cost of living, lowering barriers of entry into sustainable
jobs, with less competition), in turn, will lower the barriers of entry into
economic stability -- which is a requirement for a modern family core.

It is, actually, desirable, that one-person-income should be enough for a
family of 4 (two parents and two children). Whether parents choose that or
both work, simulatenously, is up to them.

Stable family creates purpose and emotional stability, necessary for healthy
work ethics.

\---

With that said, 3 other important fed gov initiatives that will be needed

a) affordable, not necessarily free, but truly affordable health care

b) 4-day / 6 hour work week as a 'encouraged' standard.

c) equitable divorce model where man are treated using same criteria as woman
(including for not just financial separation, but children custody as well).

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgvpxE_WKxw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgvpxE_WKxw)

------
youdontknowtho
I'm going to say something crazy, and it's cool if you disagree if you don't
call me names or kick me in the shin.

Pay people to go to school. At least for a while. Why not?

~~~
majos
“Why not” ideas seem hard to sell to governments populated by agents finding
hard to allocate resources to their own preferred causes.

------
danans
> Teachers must be not only teachers, but surrogate parents, secular
> confessors, makeshift therapists, boot-camp drill instructors, financial
> advisers, de facto cops on the beat, even truant officers or dress-rehearsal
> probation officers. Little wonder they cannot accomplish all these missions
> — much less the more modest but hardly trivial duty of inculcating academic
> excellence.

This x 1000. We need to these issues before they get to the classroom.

------
puggo
Self-checkout cash registers. Amazon. AI. When public assistance is more
profitable than entry level jobs (and the maintenance of those jobs, gas,
etc).

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dZ_lvDgevk&t=11s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dZ_lvDgevk&t=11s)

------
Paul-ish
Is child rearing and changing gender norms a factor here?

------
moretai
Perhaps television fucked my head up too much, but shouldn't a society where
women have equal pay, get rid of all this animal hierarchy bullshit and find
someone they actually connect with? Is the divorce rate still 50%? Is all of
this just to spit out a child?

------
elfexec
> Unfortunately, the two causes the article cites (dissolution of family
> structure and rise of single male households) are unaddressed.

It's unaddressed because it's the journalist class and their kind that has
waged a war against family, gender roles, gender itself and males. At least
since the 90s as far as I remember, the predominant message in media is
fathers are bad, males are bad and family is bad. Media has discouraged men
and women from getting married, having children, encouraged divorce, abortion,
etc. When a nation's media pushes nonsense like "toxic masculinity", isn't it
about time to declare the media the enemy of the nation? But what's
interesting is that the media are just propaganda of the elites. The elites
decide the media campaigns and trends which transform and socially engineer
society. The question is why? After all most of these elites and many of these
journalists are males themselves.

One solution is the diversification of the elites, media and society in
general. Not in superficial aspects like race, gender, etc, but ideology,
thought and values. Seems like there is a lot of incest within the elite/media
class. They all seem to think alike and that's not a good thing.

Also, these attacks on men are also ultimately attacks on women as well.
Ignoring the fact that half of a woman's genetic history comes from a man (
their father ), the attacks on men ultimately harm their future prospects of a
husband, family and kids. And their future hopes of happiness.

Men's suicide is increasing and women's happiness has been plummeting.

[https://www.nber.org/papers/w14969](https://www.nber.org/papers/w14969)

Add to that the below replacement birth rate of american born women, you'd
think there was a crisis in america. But we can't really discuss the real
issues here because it's verboten.

