Labor force participation in the United States is still declining as Americans sustained by federal cash stop looking for work or quit their jobs.
Only 194,000 jobs were added to the U.S. economy in September, making the smallest gain in available work since December 2020, the U.S. Department of Labor reported on Friday. That number is down from the 366,000 jobs reportedly added to the economy in August — and the 500,000 jobs the Dow Jones estimated would be added last month.
The unemployment rate fell from 5.2 percent to 4.8 percent, but the drop largely comes from workers leaving the national workforce which, in turn, is causing labor shortages across multiple industries. Labor force participation was down to 61.6 percent, nearly two points below where it was in February 2020 shortly before government-mandated lockdowns ravaged the economy.
And while private payrolls saw increases, government payroll decreased, especially with government educator jobs reportedly falling.
“The biggest factor behind last month’s weak payroll gain was a decline in public-sector jobs, mainly at schools,” the Dow Jones Newswire reported. “Employment in private-sector industries rose by 317,000 in September, with modest gains across several industries.”
The report comes just one day after President Joe Biden blamed the nation’s economic problems on people who have not received the COVID-19 shot.
“The unvaccinated also put our economy at risk because people are reluctant to go out,” Biden said at a Clayco construction site in Elk Grove Village, Illinois, overlooking his role in pushing a massive spending bill that would cost trillions of dollars.
“Even in places where there is no restriction on going to restaurants and gyms and movie theaters, people are not going in anywhere near the numbers because they’re worried they’re going to get sick,” he added.
Not only did Biden ignore the fact that his administration spent months lining Americans’ pockets with cash, but he also overlooked the role government-mandated lockdowns and extended unemployment benefits play in pushing key workers to stay home.
