Labour Force participation

Many people who want to work, are not working, and many of those who cannot find work withdrew from the Labor force because of the pandemic. Labour force participation (LFPR) is expected to recover from its historical plunge over the next two years, but not to its pre-pandemic peak according to the US Labor Department. In a recent report on February 21, 2021, by Oxford Economist Lydia Boussour, Lead US Economist. Her analysis shows that younger workers have largely returned to the workforce, while older workers are less likely to be back. She and her colleagues at Oxford expect the participation rate to rise from 61.4% currently to 62.4% by Q4 2021, and 62.6% in Q4 2022.

They attribute the 65% of the drop in the labour force participation rate (LFPR) in Q2 last year, or the drop of 1.3ppts was due to discouraged workers. Discouragement was more prevalent among younger workers, who were overrepresented in the hard-hit services industries. Encouragingly, young workers' participation has already regained two-thirds of its drop.

An acceleration of retirement trends, reflecting early retirement decisions and more disabled workers retiring, has weighed on overall participation by an estimated 0.5ppts in Q2 2020.

They estimate that around 2 million workers have left the workforce to retire since the start of the pandemic. This is more than double the number of people who left the labour force to retire in 2019 and will leave a permanent dent of about -0.4ppts on the participation rate.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell recently stated that the realization of such rebound in participation will indicate a broader recovery in the labour market which would be a signal that policy normalization can slowly begin. The Oxford Economist expect the tapering of asset purchases to begin in mid-2022, followed by rate lift-off in mid-2023.

The collapse in the LFPR has been one of the most striking labour market developments of the global coronavirus recession. The 3.1ppts plunge last year was unparalleled and nearly as large as the seven-year decline in the aftermath of the 2008-2009 recession. As of January 2021, the LFPR has only regained just over a third of its drop, with 4.3 million more people out of the workforce than in February last year.

Baby boomers take the nearest exit while participation among workers aged 55 and over fell less during the initial stages of the pandemic, it has been on a downtrend since last summer, and it is currently lower than at the worst of the crisis. We see three factors behind this development:

· the job losses associated with the coronavirus recession.

· the health risks posed by the virus for the most senior workers.

· early retirement decisions boosted by well-cushioned 401k accounts supported by strong financial market performance.

We estimate that the ageing of the population would reduce the LFPR by about 0.06ppt every quarter, or 250,000 workers, under normal circumstances. But that drag on LFPR was a large 0.5ppts in May 2020 and will reach a cumulative 1.2ppts by the end of 2022.

More than 2 million workers have left the labour force to retire since the start of the pandemic. This is more than double the number of people who dropped out of the labour force to retire in 2019.

Given the ongoing downward pressure from the retirement of baby boomers, it’s important to neutralize the effect of the ageing of the population to get a more accurate picture of labour market participation. While the reported participation rate is at its lowest level since the 1970s, our age-adjusted measure of labour force participation is at its lowest level since 2015, or 1.8ppts below its pre-pandemic level.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell recently stated that examining the share of prime-age workers holding or actively seeking work is another way of stripping out the effects of the ageing of the population. After rebounding strongly in the latter phase of the prior economic expansion, the prime-age participation rate plunged 3.1ppts last year. Following a tepid recovery, the rate is currently 1.8ppts below its pre-pandemic peak. This speaks to a future problem if rates do not increase.

This day in history

Some selective historical occurrences on this day in history.

1949, Newfoundland officially joins the Dominion of Canada and becomes the country’s 10th province. After several years of debate as to whether Newfoundland should enter Canada, become an independent country, or form an association with the United States, a 1948 runoff referendum goes for the Canadian option by a margin of 52.3 to 47.7 percent. (The first referendum had independent responsible government ahead of Canadian province hood by 44.6 to 41.1.) Not everyone knows this – well most Canadians have caught on by now – but Newfoundlanders have been screwing with our heads ever since becoming one of us. The off- by-a-half-hour time zone, that flag (what is going on there?), its domination of the CBC show This Hour Has 22 Minutes (which, with that time zone, suggests the show ends eight minutes before it starts), and the official addition to its name of “and Labrador,” which was done just to make Canadians stutter (“Newfoundland-and Labrador”) ... no wonder the Vikings cleared out.

For information here are the years each province joined the Canadian Confederation:

1867 Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick

1870 Manitoba, Northwest Territories

1871 British Columbia

1873 Prince Edward Island

1898 Yukon

1905 Saskatchewan, Alberta

1949 Newfoundland

1999 Nunavut

1889 - The Eiffel Tower, or the Tour Eiffel, was opened on March 31st, 1889, and was the work of Gustave Eiffel, who was a bridge engineer. It was made for the centenary of the French Revolution and was chosen instead of over one hundred other plans that were given.

1943: The musical "Oklahoma!" debuts on Broadway. This play, written by the famed duo Rodgers and Hammerstein, was originally titled "Away We Go" and continues to be produced by theatres across the country.

That is not Zoomerly

Thanks to Jack for this idea.

Many of my cohort (75+) are struggling with dementia, I have lost two friends to early-onset Alzheimer’s, and have one friend who is suffering from the early stages of Dementia. Today an increasing amount of people are willing to acknowledge their affliction and how it is affecting them. There are devices like the Echo devices, particularly the Echo Show have been the most useful in helping those who are suffering.

Jack in his discussions talks about how the Echo Show helps: He recounts the stories of how the device has helped several people One who is very Bible-centric who likes listening to the Bible and to her favorite preachers. Another, also a woman, who has always been a reader enjoys listening to the latest bestsellers even though she doesn't remember them afterward and she is challenged to be able to discuss her reading. Still, it helps her to feel that she is still engaged, and she still matters.

A couple, who have been separated because he is memory confined and she is in independent living, used the Echo Drop In feature to preserve their relationship. He is well along into decline and is unable to answer a phone but when she "drops in" he recognizes her, and their daily connection has helped relieve the grief of separation and isolation that they both experiences.

The attraction of the Echo Show is its ease of use after setup and the increasing effectiveness of its video connections. It is the video connection that allows the couple above to have their most emotional moments. The afflicted man has lost the ability of much verbal expression, but his body language continues to declare his love and devotion. That is very huge for those interacting with him.

The challenges of the Echo Show are many and are startling. It's surprising that Amazon doesn't just make it easier to use instead of trying to make it hip. But I suppose their market is for the young not those suffering from chronic illness or dementia. A simple example shows how it can be frustrating to use. Set up requires a Smartphone which people in dementia care don't generally use. There's no reason why a video screen on an Echo Show can't be used to do the full set up process, including creating an automatic Amazon account with a simple password to get started. Later, if the account is to be actualized with a Credit Card and ordering capability, the password and security settings can be escalated. But people dealing with dementia or near dementia need simple.

Next, there's no reason why Zoom shouldn't be as easy to initiate and use on the Amazon Echo Show is it is on any Tablet device, but Zoom has linked it in the most confusing way to calendars, which are themselves confusing to synchronize, so the effect is that Zoom is not practically accessible on the Echo Show, though it may be for Zoom theoretical technicians.

Since many families use Zoom for family gatherings, this precludes those with dementia who could join through the Drop In capability from being part of these larger family gatherings. Our hope is that someone at Zoom just gives a direction to the technical staff to get Zoom on Echo Show up and running pronto. My impression is that they (the Zoom technicians) have made the simple difficult. That's not Zoomerly.

Finally, wouldn't it be wonderful if the Echo Show had an HDMI out port, so that connection could be made to a large screen television, allowing the interactive experience to pop, and come to life big time. The availability of a web camera with effective microphone pickup for mounting on the TV would make family connections with those otherwise isolated by dementia a wonderful support force for these overlooked, forgotten, and unfortunate people.

Lets get Physical

Given the increasing incidence of cognitive impairment and dementia, further understanding of modifiable factors contributing to increased healthspan is crucial. Extensive literature provides evidence that physical activity (PA) delays the onset of cognitive impairment; however, it is unclear whether engaging in PA in older adulthood is sufficient to influence progression through cognitive status categories.

Method

Applying a coordinated analysis approach, a study independently analyzed 14 longitudinal studies from North America and Europe using multistate survival models to estimate the impact of engaging in PA on cognitive status transitions (nonimpaired, mildly impaired, severely impaired) and death.

Results

Controlling for baseline age, sex, education, and chronic conditions, analyses revealed that more PA is significantly associated with decreased risk of transitioning from nonimpaired to mildly impaired cognitive functioning and death, as well as substantially longer Life Expectancy. Results also provided evidence for a protective effect of Physical Activity after the onset of cognitive impairment (e.g., decreased risk of transitioning from mild-to-severe cognitive impairment; increased likelihood of transitioning backward from a severe-to-mild cognitive impairment), though between-study heterogeneity suggests a less robust association.

Conclusions

These results yield evidence for the importance of engaging in Physical Activity of at least 150 minutes a week in older adulthood for cognitive health and a rationale for motivating older adults to engage consistently in Physical Activity.