Who is employed, who is unemployed, and who’s not in the labor force? Data that answer these questions are reported by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) using the Current Population Survey (CPS) conducted by the US Census. FRED has monthly data on the CPS starting on January 1, 1948, which translates into 906 data points between that date and July 1, 2023. Today, we use that happenstance to celebrate this, our 906th FRED Blog post. Yes, we are that data-nerdy.

Take a look back and you’ll see that the FRED Blog has tapped into many of the 8,449 data series from the Household Survey of the CPS to tell the stories behind those numbers. Here’s a sample, including the FRED graph above for the unemployment rate, the most popular series among them on FRED:

• Civilian Labor Force: Are labor supply and labor demand out of balance?
• Civilian Labor Force Participation Rate: Labor force participation rates of armed forces veterans
• Employment: Employment growth after the macro disruptions of COVID and World War II
• Employment Population Ratio: What’s the story behind who’s working?
• Unemployment Level: Ceasing emergency federal unemployment benefits: A look at the latest state-level data
• Unemployment Rate: Comparing unemployment rates by race: The Great Recession vs. COVID-19
• Not in Labor Force: A greater number of workers still remain outside the labor force
• Labor Force Participation Rate: A closer look at labor in the U.S.
• Multiple Jobholders: Moonlighting in the spotlight
• Duration of Unemployment: The unusual duration of unemployment
• Losers and Leavers: Unemployed Job Leavers: A Meaningful Gauge of Confidence in the Job Market? (from the BLS)
• Earnings: Trying to measure manager vs. non-manager pay
• Entrants and Reentrants: Labor Market Exit and Re-Entry: Is the United States Poised for a Rebound in the Labor Force Participation Rate? (from the Boston Fed)
• Labor Force Status Flows: How labor market flows changed

Stay tuned to the FRED Blog as we continue to tap into the CPS to tell interesting stories about the labor market.

How this graph was created: On the FRED homepage, look for the most popular series and click on the unemployment rate. Click on the first choice.

Suggested by Diego Mendez-Carbajo.

The overall labor force participation rate (LFRP) remains below its pre-pandemic level: 62.5% in February 2023 vs. 63.3% in February 2020. And disaggregating the data by age reveals some interesting trends.

The LFPR rates for adults 55 and older (in blue) and teens (in red) form the double-helix-like graph above. A few things stand out: First, teens were more likely to be in the labor force than seniors prior to the Global Financial Crisis in 2007. In August 1989, the LFPR for teens (57.4%) was almost twice that of seniors (30.1%). However, this gap closed throughout the 1990s and 2000s, and in October 2008 seniors became more likely to be in the labor force than teens.

But this has started to change again. After reaching an all-time low of 32.5% in February 2014, the teen LFPR started to rise again. It’s risen even more steadily after the pandemic, returning to pre-pandemic levels after a year; and in recent months it has reached its highest level since 2009. In contrast, the share of seniors in the labor force dropped after the pandemic and has shown no sign of recovery; in February 2023, it stood at its lowest level since before the Global Financial Crisis.

Two key pandemic trends are driving this. First, many older workers left the labor force during the pandemic due to health concerns or rising asset values. Miguel Faria e Castro has estimated that there were more than 2.4 million excess retirements from February 2020 to August 2021. Second, the tight labor market has led to more job opportunities for teen workers; with wages up and firms more willing to train and employ teens, college enrollment has declined and more teens are moving into the workforce.

How this graph was created: Search FRED for “Labor Force Participation Rate – 55 Yrs. & over.” Click “Edit Graph,” open the “Add Line” tab, and add “Labor Force Participation Rate – 16-19 Yrs.”

Suggested by Nathan Jefferson.

As the US began to emerge from the pandemic, many different news sources provided many different explanations for the labor shortage: from childcare disruptions and fear of illness keeping minimum wage workers out of the labor force to a new wave of retirements from older workers.

A previous post looked at the labor force overall, but today we look at changes in the labor force participation rate (LFPR) for specific age groups: 20 to 24 years old, 25 to 54 years old, and 55+ years old. We subtract the LFPR from January 2020 to show the percentage-point change in labor force participation relative to the month right before the pandemic.

When the pandemic hit, the sharpest decline in the LFPR was for workers between the ages of 20 and 24. Their LFPR decreased from 73% to 64.4% in 4 months before increasing again. However, at the end of 2022, the LFPR for 20- to 24-year-olds still hadn’t fully recovered and remained 1.7 percentage points below its January 2020 value.

This overall pattern is similar but less extreme for the other age groups. Although no age group fully recovered by the end of 2022, the 25-54 group was closest, at 0.7 percentage points below its January 2002 level. There’s been much discussion of older workers retiring early (and permanently) during the pandemic, and the 55+ group remained 1.4 percentage points below its January 2020 level as of December 2022, with no sign of further recovery.

How this graph was created: Search FRED for “Labor Force Participation 20-24” and select “Labor Force Participation Rate- 20-24 Yrs.” Click the orange “Edit Graph” button on the right: From the “Add Line” section, add the 25-54 age group by searching for and selecting “Labor Force Participation Rate, 25-54 Yrs.” Repeat this process for the “55 plus” series. All three series should have “Percent” as the units. You must customize each series by subtracting the value for the series in January 2020: From the “Edit Line” section for each age group, use the customize data section at the bottom add the following formulas in the formula bar and hit “Apply”: For 20-24 Yrs, insert a-73.0; for 25-54 Yrs, insert a-83.1; for 55+ Yrs, insert a-40.2. Finally, change the beginning date of the graph to 2018-01-01.

Suggested by Maggie Isaacson and Hannah Rubinton.