[fintstone]

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/12/upshot/unemployment-the-vanishing-male-worker-how-america-fell-behind.html?abt=0002&abg=0

I see this as one of our nation's biggest problems. Lots of folks who do not work. Many by choice (pay or work is not up to their standards). I don't see this as a PARF topic, because it is an apolitical problem...but do believe actions that gov't (both parties) have taken has caused much of this. From the article "The Vanishing Male Worker":

"...Working, in America, is in decline. The share of prime-age men — those 25 to 54 years old — who are not working has more than tripled since the late 1960s, to 16 percent. More recently, since the turn of the century, the share of women without paying jobs has been rising, too. The United States, which had one of the highest employment rates among developed nations as recently as 2000, has fallen toward the bottom of the list..."

"...Many men, in particular, have decided that low-wage work will not improve their lives, in part because deep changes in American society have made it easier for them to live without working. These changes include the availability of federal disability benefits; the decline of marriage, which means fewer men provide for children; and the rise of the Internet, which has reduced the isolation of unemployment..." (read the rest at the link)