Almost 100 million Americans who could work aren’t. Burdening the labor market with payroll taxes, obamacare, regulatory compliance costs, minimum wage and indiscriminate college loan subsidies, among other things, as well as creating a wage floor with welfare, unemployment insurance, food stamps, etc., creates systemic unemployment like this. The value to employers of the work these Americans could do falls below the wage these Americans are permitted or willing to take. That in turn creates a huge black market for labor, which is why “immigration reform” will never achieve its stated goal. Liberate the labor market and we would achieve without even trying a just, sustainable, organic rate of immigration that responds to genuine demographic and technological factors.
From ZeroHedge:
Participation Rate Crashes To October 1977 Level: Americans Not In The Labor Force Soar By 579,000 To Record 94.6 Million