Unless somebody has money already, the numbers of people who choose not to work are so vanishingly small that they aren't even worth mentioning. That of course doesn't include housewives.
Why not include housewives? But as for the others....14 million full time students ages 16-24 are neither working nor trying to work. I don't think most of them are desperate for jobs. 24 million disabled not working or trying to work. And even not counting those also disabled, there are 26 million people age 65 and older not working or trying to work.
That's 64 million people right there....2/3s of those Not in the Labor Force, but you're claiming the real reason most of them aren't trying to work is because there are no jobs? Even though most of them say they don't want a job?
People choose not to work for one main reason. There are no jobs! I KNOW because I've been there. I was one of the discouraged workers.
So the 90 million who say they don't want a job (or are too disabled to work) are lying?
Also, did you know that some people are just too poor to work! I'll bet you never thought of that one. Looking for work and going to work often REQUIRES owning a car. If you can't afford a car, then what. (And any "Mc Job" you find won't give you the ability to buy one) I can tell you what. Jumping through hoops that you and people like you can shove up their ass.
Yes, I am well aware of that. In December there were 1,684,000 people who had looked for work in the last year but not since Thanksgiving, who wanted a job and could have accepted if offered. 426,000 weren't looking because they believed there were no jobs, or that they lacked the education or skills for what jobs there were, or that they would face discrimination. 235,000 had family responsibilities that made them quit their job search. 247,000 stopped looking because they went back to school or enrolled in training. 148,000 stopped looking because they became sick or got hurt. And 627,000 stopped looking because they had no child care, or transportation, or a few other uncategorized.
Also, how in the hell would any government agency know if you became discouraged.
They ask. It's this nifty science called "statistics" where you don't actually have to ask every person in a population, but you can ask a sample and reach an approximation of the real number. For example, I said there were 426,000 discouraged....that's +/- 60,000 at 90% confidence.
Face it. The government's job is in supplying BS. You know what would be interesting is that if along with saying how many people found work as they sometimes do on the news, they also mention how many people lost jobs during the same time period.
Well, the number that "found work" is actually the net change..hires - losses.
But if you want those numbers, that's easy...for non-farm payroll jobs, 4,850,000 people were hired during November. 2,553,000 people quit. 1,563,000 were laid off or fired. And 279,000 retired, died, or left the country.
Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary
If you want to include agriculture and look at unemployment and not in the Labor Force as well, go to Lab
or Force Statistics from the Current Population Survey