Unemployment rate drops to 7.4%

[_ajax18]

People don't necessarily choose not to work. Some people are retired.

Retiring is choosing not to work.

Some are stay at home parents.

Could stay at home parents choose to work outside the home and cart the kids off to Nancy Pelosi's taxpayer funded daycare?

Some are in prison.

Don't many people work in prison?

Some are disabled.

Until I found out about double and triple dippers, I didn't realize you could collect several kinds of disability and still hold a full time job.

Some are actively seeking employment but cannot find it.

We still have immigrants coming into the country filling jobs. Perhaps you mean, people can't find jobs that suit their standards.

Some are independently wealthy.

That's a choice not to work as well just like retirement. Perhaps that's one of the rare cases where capitalism produces a malincentive to work.

[_Brackite]

August Jobs Report: Instant Analysis and Implications for Taper; Summers’s Strife; Ford Exit Plan

Breaking news: The Labor Department says there were 169,000 jobs created in August. That's below expectations which were for 175,000 to 180,000. The unemployment rate made a surprise dip down to 7.3%. That's its lowest level since President Obama took office. But the labor participation rate also dropped to its lowest level since 1978: 63.2%.

Here Are the Real Labor Force Dropouts

The dominant story about the job market is no longer the nation’s 11.3 million unemployed people or the painfully slow pace of hiring. It’s the growing portion of the working-age population that has dropped out of the labor force and isn’t even looking for a job.

The jobs report for August seemed upbeat on the surface, since the unemployment rate dropped by one-tenth of a point to 7.3%. But analysts have been quick to point out that the unemployment rate fell because the number of people looking for work -- part of the numerator in the equation used to determine the unemployment rate -- declined. That’s usually a sign of an ailing economy, not a recovering one.

[_ajax18]

It’s the growing portion of the working-age population that has dropped out of the labor force and isn’t even looking for a job.

How do you give up looking for work? Disability!