Hundreds of thousands of Americans are streaming back into an improving labor market as employers raise wages and hire less skilled job candidates to cope with an intensifying worker shortage.
Labor Department figures show the portion of the U.S. population working or looking for jobs – known as the labor force participation rate – has risen from 62.4% to 62.9% since September.
The rate had been falling since 2008, mostly because of baby boomers retiring, and that’s still expected to be the long-term trend, yet part of the decline was caused by a bruising post-recession job market that prompted discouraged workers to drop out of the labor force and many other unemployed Americans to retire, go on disability or return to school.
At least some of those idled workers are returning to work or looking again – now that the jobless rate has fallen to 4.9% – a level many economists consider full employment.
The labor market continues to improve, but it could mean another rate hike at a time when most countries are cutting theirs.
Many economists are worried about a global “death spiral” caused by weaker commodity and oil prices, a strong US dollar, and slowing global growth in both emerging and developed markets.
