America's Vanishing Worker: The Truth Behind The "Recovery" Propaganda

The biggest paradox of the so-called US recovery is that in the same report in which the US Department of Labor reported that the US unemployment has dropped to a depression-low 5.4%, a level suggesting near zero "slack" in the labor force, the BLS also indicated that the number of people not in the labor force rose to a fresh all time high of 93.2 million, keeping the participation rate at a level first seen in 1978.

How does one make sense of this glaring contradiction and paradoxical data, which one one hand suggest the recovery is fully in place, while on the other screams depression?

For the answer we go to the WSJ's report on the curious case of America's vanishing worker.

To be sure, this "curious case" covers nothing new for regular Zero Hedge readers, but may explain to casual observers how it is possible that America's labor metrics have devolved to such a Schrodingerian state in which the US labor market is both alive and dead, depending on whose propaganda one observes.

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