Washington Examiner economics columnist Tiana Lowe Doescher argued that the biggest problem facing young Americans may not be a lack of jobs, but a growing disengagement from work, school, and social life.
“It’s not that they’re looking for jobs and can’t find them. It’s that they’re spending all this time alone,” Lowe Doescher said on Newmax’s The Right Squad Monday. “They aren’t going on dates. They aren’t hanging out with friends. They aren’t in a sports league.”
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According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the share of men ages 16 to 24 in the workforce has fallen to 56.1%, down nearly 13 percentage points from 69% in 2000.
Social isolation among Gen Z is also on the rise. According to the American Time Use Survey, nearly 10% of adults ages 23 to 29 reported having no face-to-face interactions with others on an average day, compared with 3% in 2019.
“Prime-age employment is really high,” Lowe Doescher said. “It’s just these young people. They don’t want to get a job.”
Lowe Doescher also pointed to Mississippi as proof that “decline is a choice,” arguing that schools can improve outcomes by raising expectations.
“They are now the fastest gains in both reading and math scores, and they did it the old-fashioned way: Let people fail,” she said.
Mississippi fourth graders posted the nation’s largest gains in reading and math between 2013 and 2024, with the state’s fourth-grade reading rank jumping from 49th to ninth.
