“If the employment-to-population ratio were the same today as it was before the COVID-19 pandemic in February 2020, 2.6 million more people would be employed today,” writes Rachel Greszler over at the Economic Policy Innovation Center. Who are these guys?
Data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics reveal that the largest group of missing workers is made up of individuals ages 65 and older. According to studies, they retired earlier thanks to “the windfall in financial benefits that this population was able to benefit from.” That windfall was entirely housing wealth, apparently.
The second largest category of missing workers: Individual, age 20 to 24, specifically those without children. Meanwhile, women with kids under the age of 6 are not missing in action.
Contrary to conventional logic and widespread media reports that parents’—and particularly mothers’—employment has suffered because of childcare struggles, the opposite appears to be true. . . .
According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics Current Population Survey, employment among workers with children under age 18 at home is up 1.0 percent since the start of the pandemic while employment among workers without children at home is down 2.1 percent.
Drilling deeper into the data defies the narrative even further. Employment among women with children (+1.3 percent) has increased more than employment among men with children (+0.6 percent), and the biggest gain—a 2.7 percent increase—has occurred among women with children under age six.
The whole thing is here.