00:00Believe it or not, Americans are working less than they did in the 1950s and 60s.
00:04We still work more than other countries, but the gap is starting to close.
00:08I mean, how is that possible when we all feel chained to our desks and our phones?
00:11So why is it that Americans are working fewer hours?
00:14Well, there's a lot of reasons.
00:16A big one is that more men are leaving the labor force.
00:19Why is also not entirely well understood,
00:21but a new paper suggests one reason could be the expansion of Medicaid,
00:25which in 1970 only covered 10% of the population.
00:28But in 2020, it covers 30%.
00:31The way Medicaid works is the more you work, the more likely you are to lose Medicaid.
00:35So it becomes an incentive to work less.
00:37Why is a decline in working hours even a problem?
00:40Part of the problem is this isn't always voluntary.
00:42For instance, a lot of older workers face age discrimination or can't find suitable work.
00:46And so they get shoved out of the labor force before they're ready or can afford to retire.
00:51Some of it is people work part-time when they'd like to be working full-time.
00:54Another curious statistic is that in the 50s and 60s,
00:58poorer people worked more than high earners.
01:01Now that's reversed.
01:02And that what we see is people who earn more tend to work more hours
01:05and people who earn less work fewer hours.
01:07The problem is also that men are leaving the labor force
01:10because you have a population that could be contributing to the economy
01:13and is instead drawing on benefits.
01:15It's just not sustainable.
01:16America's going to have to face the music one way or another.
01:18America's going to be aаемсяous provocateur.
01:19America's going to be aся planners professional
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