President Donald J. Trump wants to bring more factories and manufacturing to America.
We applaud his efforts but realize he has an uphill road to get there, mainly having the workforce to do the job.
I think one of the problems we have today with our workforce was brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic when there were so many layoffs and unemployment benefits were extended for many months.
Here at the Roundup, we lease part of our building to an employment service. During the pandemic, there were always people at the employment office. I figured they were all looking for jobs but soon found out different.
At the time, the Biden administration and Congress used a lot of dollars to extend unemployment benefits by many months.
The employment service wasn’t getting very many people hired, as most everyone wanted to fill out an application and take it to the unemployment office to get the benefits.
It caused quite a racket as there were many jobs open and most were just using government funds to not work.
I recently read an article in Moneywise on comments made by American TV Host and Philanthropist Mike Rowe who believes there’s a “horror story” unfolding in the American labor market.
Rowe has been talking across America lately on the need for young people to go to a trade school instead of attending college.
Rowe said, “The stat that sticks with me and worries me is 7.2 million able-bodied men, today in their prime working years, are not only unemployed, they’re officially not even looking.”
The article said Rowe did not provide a source for this statistic, but the number of prime-working-age men – ages 25 to 54 – not participating in the labor market was around seven million in March 2025, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). There was no information on whether they were “able-bodied” or not.
In the article, Rowe also pointed to the shortage of tradespeople in the U.S. and said the nation’s labor force is “wildly out of balance.”
The statistics show why men have abandoned the formal economy. According to BLS, men between the ages of 25 and 54 saw their labor force participation rate drop from 98 percent in September 1954 to 89.1 percent in March 2025.
To understand why men in their prime were participating less, the Bipartisan Policy Cent conducted a survey in 2024. The survey showed 57 percent of prime-age men not seeking work cited physical, mental or behavioral health reasons.
Close to 30 percent said they are not working by choice, and nine percent said they are busy caring for others.
This was significantly different from men who are looking for work, of whom only 16 percent said their physical or mental health was the main reason they were out of work.
Men who are not employed and not looking for work may not be as able-bodied or mentally able as Rowe thinks, but his thoughts about an unbalanced labor market could be right, as some men seem to have acquired skills which are no longer a good fit for the labor market.
Those surveyed said they would go back to work if there were better health insurance, sick leave, accommodations for disabilities, flexible working arrangements and mental health benefits.
That may be asking a lot.
Dennis Sun is the publisher of the Wyoming Livestock Roundup, a weekly agriculture newspaper available online and in print.
