UConn Economists Link 69.5% Male Work Rate to Childhood Exposure to Weak Wages

2 articles · Updated · Fortune · Jun 21

A new paper by Remy Levin and Daniela Vidart argues men are less likely to join the labor force when childhood exposure to weak wages and high unemployment leaves them pessimistic about future work returns.
Those experience effects can turn short-term labor-demand shocks into long-term labor-supply declines, the authors said, and they persisted even after men moved states while appearing stronger within their own racial group.
The study says formative years explain nearly all of the participation dynamics it identifies, with men's expectations tied more to lifetime local observations than to national indicators such as unemployment or inflation.
U.S. male labor-force participation was 69.5% in May, down from 76% in May 2006 and 86.4% in 1950, extending a multigenerational decline economists have also linked to schooling, caregiving, disability, status pressures and widening wage gaps.