纽约（美国有线电视新闻网）今年一个更阴险的神话是，年轻人不想工作，因为他们靠政府援助过得很好。人们有太多的钱，去叙述。
唯一的问题是，数字不支持它。
相反，提前退休——无论是大流行强迫的还是其他可能的——在美国不断变化的劳动力市场中发挥着重要作用。
在过去的两年里，人们出于各种原因离开了劳动力市场——裁员、健康不安全、儿童保育需求以及由大流行造成的破坏引起的任何数量的个人问题。但在那些已经离开但不能——或不想——返回的人中，绝大多数是加速退休的老年美国人。
本月早些时候，ADP 首席经济学家内拉·理查森 (Nela Richardson) 表示，强劲的股市和飙升的房价“为一些高收入人群提供了选择。我们已经看到大量婴儿潮一代劳动力退休。他们现在处于更好的位置。 ”
经济学家在评估就业复苏时指出，虽然失业率有所下降，但劳动力参与率并未同步改善。但乔拜登总统经济顾问委员会成员贾里德伯恩斯坦表示，一旦“非黄金年龄”工人——即 55 岁以上——被排除在指标之外，就会更清楚地了解劳动力复苏的情况，因为它剥夺了退出退休故事。
明尼苏达大学卡尔森管理学院的劳工经济学家兼教授亚伦·索杰纳 (Aaron Sojourner) 表示，与 2019 年 11 月相比，上个月离开劳动力市场并表示不想工作的美国人增加了 360 万。
55 岁及以上的美国老年人占这一增长的 90%。
“我认为很多叙述都认为壮年工人失踪了，但实际上它更老了，”Sojourner 告诉 CNN Business。
劳动力短缺和退休
经常哀叹的劳动力短缺已成为大流行时期劳动力复杂现实的简写。
美国人正在以创纪录的数量辞掉工作——自 7 月以来，每个月都有超过 400 万人辞职——但其中大部分辞职发生在去从事其他工作或获得更高薪水的年轻人中。他们并没有完全离开劳动力市场。
“部分原因是工作质量短缺，”Sojourner 说。 “这有点令人困惑，为什么雇主没有足够快地提高工资和改善工作条件以吸引人们重返工作岗位。他们说他们想招聘员工——有 1100 万个职位空缺——但他们并没有创造这样的职位空缺人们想要。”
美联储主席杰罗姆鲍威尔在周三的新闻发布会上强调了这个问题。
“所有这一切背后都有一个人口趋势......我们能拿回多少是一个很好的问题，我们能做的就是努力创造条件，”让人们回来，他说。
可以肯定的是，一些公司一直在提高工资以吸引和留住员工。一些企业还提供签约奖金以吸引工人上门。但经济学家不确定这些激励措施是否会继续存在，并会长期改善工人的条件。
“我可以花 50 美元买一台 65 英寸的电视，但这并不意味着电视短缺，这意味着我不愿意支付足够的钱让别人卖给我一台电视，”Sojourner 说。
据高盛的研究人员称，在大流行期间离开劳动力市场的 500 万人中，有近 70% 的人年龄在 55 岁以上，其中许多人不打算返回。
研究人员写道，与其他劳动力退出相比，退休往往“更具粘性”。即便如此，他们预计病毒状况的改善和疫苗接种的增加将使老年工人重返劳动力市场。
在正常情况下，退休人员经常会被吸引回劳动力市场。但根据堪萨斯城联储的研究，大流行期间“未退休”率大幅下降，加剧了工人短缺。
有一些早期迹象表明，随着疫苗接种率的提高和雇主提供更高的工资，老年人正在重返工作岗位。 Indeed 的经济学家尼克·邦克 (Nick Bunker) 表示，在大流行初期，未退休率降至略高于 2%，但最近几个月已升至 2.6% 左右。这仍与大流行前约 3% 的比率有所不同。
再说一次，年长的工人可能会与更年轻、更有资格的求职者竞争，这可能会使他们的回归更具挑战性。
How millions of jobless Americans can afford to ditch work
New York (CNN Business)One of the more insidious myths this year was that young people didn't want to work because they were getting by just fine on government aid. People had too much money, went the narrative.
Only trouble is, the numbers don't back it up.
Instead, early retirement — whether forced by the pandemic or made possible otherwise — is playing a big role in America's evolving labor market.
People have left the workforce for myriad reasons in the past two years — layoffs, health insecurity, child care needs, and any number of personal issues that arose from the disruption caused by the pandemic. But among those who have left and are not able to — or don't want to — return, the vast majority are older Americans who accelerated their retirement.
Earlier this month, ADP Chief Economist Nela Richardson said the strong stock market along with soaring home prices "has given some higher income people options. We already saw a large portion of the Boomer workforce retiring. And they're in a better position now."
In assessing the jobs recovery, economists have pointed out that while the unemployment rate has come down, the labor force participation rate hasn't improved at the same pace. But Jared Bernstein, a member of President Joe Biden's Council of Economic Advisers, said that once "non-prime age" workers — those over 55 — are excluded from the metrics a much clearer picture of how the labor recovery is doing emerges because it strips out the retirement narrative.
Last month, there were 3.6 million more Americans who had left the labor force and said they didn't want a job compared with November 2019, says Aaron Sojourner, a labor economist and professor at the University of Minnesota's Carlson School of Management.
Older Americans, age 55 and up, accounted for whopping 90% of that increase.
"I think a lot of the narratives imagine prime-age workers as being missing, but it actually skews much older," Sojourner told CNN Business.
The labor shortage and retirement
The oft-lamented labor shortage has become a shorthand for the complicated reality of the pandemic-era labor force.
Americans are quitting their jobs in record numbers — more than 4 million each month since July — but much of that quitting is happening among young people who are leaving for other jobs or better pay. They're not leaving the workforce entirely.
"Part of it is a job quality shortage," says Sojourner. "It's a bit of a puzzle why employers aren't raising wages and improving working conditions fast enough to draw people back in. They say they want to hire people — there are 11 million job openings — but they're not creating job openings that people want."
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell underscored that issue during a news conference on Wednesday.
"There's a demographic trend underlying all of this... The question of how much we can get back is a good one, and what we can do is try to create the conditions," that allow people to come back, he said.
To be sure, some companies have been raising wages to attract and retain staff. Some businesses also offer signing bonuses to get workers in the door. But economists aren't sure whether these incentives are here to stay and will improve conditions for workers in the long term.
"I can want a 65-inch TV for $50, but it doesn't mean there's a TV shortage, it means I'm not willing to pay enough to get somebody to sell me a TV," said Sojourner.
Nearly 70% of the 5 million people who left the labor force during the pandemic are older than 55, according to researchers from Goldman Sachs, and many of them aren't looking to return.
Retirements tend to be "stickier" than other labor force exits, the researchers wrote. Even so, they expect that an improving virus situation and increased vaccination will allow older workers to return to the labor force.
In normal times, retired people are often drawn back into the workforce. But the "unretirement" rate fell significantly during the pandemic, exacerbating the shortage of workers, according to research from the Kansas City Fed.
There are some early signs that seniors are coming back to the workforce as vaccination rates increase and employers offer higher wages. The unretirement rate fell to just over 2% early in the pandemic, but in recent months has ticked up to around 2.6%, according to Nick Bunker, an economist at Indeed. That's still off from the pre-pandemic rate of around 3%.
Then again, older workers are potentially competing with younger, more qualified applicants for jobs, which could make their return more challenging.
