The American workforce is shrinking, and the decline is becoming difficult to dismiss as just another monthly fluctuation in the jobs data.

More than 1 million people have disappeared from the U.S. labor force over the past year, while the share of Americans working or actively looking for work has fallen to its lowest level since the aftermath of the pandemic.

The decline is being driven by several forces hitting at once: millions of baby boomers reaching retirement age, fewer younger workers coming behind them, tighter immigration, and a difficult hiring market that may be convincing some frustrated job seekers to simply stop looking.

For an economy that depends on a growing workforce to support everything from consumer spending to Social Security, the trend could have consequences well beyond the monthly jobs report.

America’s Workforce Has Shrunk by More Than 1 Million

The U.S. labor force stood at approximately 169.1 million people in July, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. A year earlier, it was roughly 170.4 million.

That represents a decline of about 1.3 million people in just 12 months, with much of the drop occurring recently.

At the same time, the labor-force participation rate fell to 61.4% in July, its lowest level since February 2021.

The participation rate measures the percentage of the population that is either employed or actively searching for work. It can therefore reveal something the headline unemployment rate does not: how many potential workers have stopped participating in the labor market altogether.

“Declines in the participation rate are becoming more concerning, as it’s currently near historic lows,” Dominic Pappalardo, chief multi-asset strategist at Morningstar Wealth, said in a note.

Excluding the extraordinary disruption caused by the pandemic, the participation rate has not been this low in decades.

Baby Boomers Are Leaving the Workforce

The most predictable force behind the decline is also one of the hardest to reverse.

America’s enormous baby boomer generation continues to age out of the workforce. Even the youngest boomers are now in their early 60s, meaning the country is moving deeper into a demographic transition that economists have been anticipating for years.

Cory Stahle, senior economist at the Indeed Hiring Lab, described boomer retirements as the most consistent force pushing participation lower.

Unlike a temporary economic slowdown, this part of the workforce decline is structural. Workers who retire at 65 or 70 generally aren’t waiting for a stronger jobs report before returning to work.

That matters because a smaller labor force can constrain the economy’s ability to grow. Businesses have fewer workers to hire, fewer people are earning wages, and the ratio between workers and retirees can continue to deteriorate.

There Aren’t Enough Young Workers to Replace Them

Retirements would be less problematic if a large new generation of workers were entering the labor market behind the boomers.

But America faces another demographic problem: birth rates have been declining for years.

Matthew Martin, senior U.S. economist at Oxford Economics, said the combination of an aging population, lower birth rates and tighter immigration policies is putting additional pressure on the workforce.

“As older workers continue their large-scale exit from the workforce, we don’t necessarily have other additional young workers to fill their spot,” Martin said.

Immigration has historically helped offset some of America’s demographic challenges by expanding the working-age population. Tighter immigration rules and increased enforcement under President Donald Trump’s second administration could reduce that source of labor-force growth as well.

The result is a simple demographic equation: more Americans are reaching retirement age while fewer new workers are available to replace them.

Some Americans May Simply Be Giving Up on Finding a Job

Demographics, however, don’t explain everything.

There is another possibility buried in the numbers: some Americans may be leaving the workforce because finding a job has become so difficult.

Under the government’s definition, unemployed Americans are generally counted as part of the labor force only if they have actively looked for work during the previous four weeks.

That distinction becomes important when job searches stretch for months.

The July jobs report showed unemployed Americans were taking nearly 25 weeks on average to find their next job. Roughly one-quarter of unemployed job seekers had been searching for at least six months.

Someone who spends months submitting applications without getting hired may eventually stop searching temporarily. Once that person goes more than four weeks without actively looking, he or she can disappear from the official labor force even though the underlying desire for a job may not have changed.

There were approximately 503,000 “discouraged workers” in July, according to the BLS, up from roughly 460,000 a year earlier. These are people who aren’t currently searching for work, potentially because they believe no suitable jobs are available.

“The fear here is we move to a state where people say ‘I’m no longer looking,’” Stahle said. “I’m just kind of giving up on my job search right now.”

Why This Matters for the Economy

A shrinking workforce creates a problem that extends far beyond employment statistics.

Economic growth ultimately depends on two major ingredients: how many people are working and how productive those workers are. If the number of available workers declines, productivity must rise faster simply to maintain the same long-term growth trajectory.

Labor shortages can also put upward pressure on wages in industries struggling to find employees. Higher wages are good for workers, but if businesses cannot offset those costs through productivity improvements, they can contribute to higher prices or lower corporate profit margins.

There is also a potential feedback loop. A weak hiring environment can push discouraged workers out of the labor force, while a smaller labor pool can make it harder for businesses to expand when economic conditions improve.

That makes the participation rate an increasingly important number to watch alongside payroll growth and unemployment.

The Social Security Math Gets Harder

The demographic shift also has major implications for Social Security and Medicare.

These programs rely heavily on payroll taxes collected from today’s workers to finance benefits for today’s retirees. As baby boomers leave their jobs, many effectively move from one side of that equation to the other: they stop contributing payroll taxes through employment and begin collecting retirement benefits.

A declining ratio of workers to retirees places increasing pressure on the system.

That does not mean a one-year decline in the labor force suddenly creates a Social Security crisis. But if America’s working population stagnates or contracts for an extended period while its retired population continues growing, the financing challenge becomes more difficult.

Policies that increase labor-force participation, immigration, productivity or the number of working-age Americans could therefore become increasingly important as the population ages.

One Number Investors Should Keep Watching

Monthly employment reports can be volatile, and summer hiring patterns can make individual readings especially difficult to interpret. The recent decline could moderate or reverse as more data arrives.

But the longer-term demographic forces are much harder to ignore.

Millions of baby boomers will continue reaching retirement age. America’s birth rate cannot quickly produce millions of additional working-age adults. Immigration policy remains a major variable, and the current hiring slowdown could push additional discouraged workers toward the sidelines.

The key question now isn’t simply whether unemployment rises or falls.

It’s whether the United States can keep enough people participating in the workforce to support an aging population and maintain economic growth.

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