Millions of able-bodied American men have stopped working and stopped looking, and two prominent voices spent a Friday night wondering why.
Comedian Bill Maher and "Dirty Jobs" host Mike Rowe traded figures and theories on the labor-force exodus during a segment posted to the YouTube channel for "Real Time with Bill Maher." Maher put the count at roughly 7 million men, mostly young, who fall into a category economists label NILF, short for not in the labor force. He drew the line between that group and the unemployed, noting that jobless workers at least keep hunting for a paycheck while these men have quit the search entirely.
Rowe fixed the number at close to 6,990,000 and called the trend unprecedented outside of wartime. He pinned much of the trouble on a college system that saddled graduates with debt while leaving skilled work undone. Student loans have swelled to $1.8 trillion, Rowe said on the program, up from $1.1 trillion when he last appeared. He counted about 400,000 open construction jobs and twice that figure across the defense industrial base. (RELATED: Bill Maher Draws Audible Gasps From Audience When He Reads DSA's Own Words)
For every five tradespeople who leave the workforce, only two arrive to replace them, a gap Rowe said on the segment has held for roughly 12 years, a ratio he has cited repeatedly in his campaign for the skilled trades.
Chief Executive Jim Farley has said the automaker cannot staff about 5,000 open mechanic positions that pay $120,000 a year, according to Fortune, which reported his comments from the Office Hours: Business Edition podcast. Rowe describes such roles as beyond the reach of artificial intelligence.
The alarm traces to economist Nicholas Eberstadt, whose book "Men Without Work" first appeared in 2016 and returned in a 2022 edition. The American Enterprise Institute scholar has documented a large and growing population of men who have abandoned the job hunt.
Maher floated pornography as the culprit, arguing it strips young men of the drive that once pushed them toward a job and a partner. Rowe granted the point before joking that many men perhaps have taken "matters into their own hands," drawing laughter from the audience.
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