From John Mauldin's blog.[0]
| I have been promising a review of Nicholas Eberstadt’s | very important book, Men Without Work: America’s Invisible | Crisis. The book is relatively short at 216 pages, but it | is packed with meaty facts and insights. ... The “invisible | crisis” that the author is writing about is at the very | center of our economic and political turmoil. | | At its heart, the book is about the fact that there are some | 10 million American men of prime working age (25 to 54) who | have simply dropped out of the workforce, and the great | majority of them have not only dropped out of the workforce, | they have also dropped out from any commitments or | responsibilities to society. It is not just the labor force | they are not participating in; they are not participating | in the normal ebb and flow of community life. | ... | | As we shall see, a single variable – having a criminal record | – is a key missing piece in explaining why work rates and | LFPRs have collapsed much more dramatically in America than | other affluent Western societies over the past two generations. | This single variable also helps explain why the collapse has | been so much greater for American men than women and why it | has been so much more dramatic for African American men and | men with low educational attainment than for other prime-age | men in the United States. That is, with admittedly some license taken, it is arguably the bloody War Against Drugs that has been destroying the US economy and culture. Oops :( 0) http://www.mauldineconomics.com/frontlinethoughts/men-without-work