The 2020 average was revised to 61.8 and the 2021 average is 61.7.
One way to grow the participation rate, as seen in the first chart, which is monthly, is TO NOT HAVE TO COUNT PEOPLE.
How do you do that?
The economy sucks so bad you drop out of the labor force, which instantly shrinks its size. So as jobs recover a little bit the participation rate looks better because more people compared with the smaller underlying base are working again.
Not in labor force on an average basis hit an all time high in 2021 of 100.24m, pushed mostly by the 2008 catastrophe for older workers, while growth in the labor force has been anemic to flat because people aren't having enough kids.
People who remember the malaise of the Jimmy Carter era who are still alive today can relate.
CIVPART hovering on the 63% line was the Trump era's "greatest economy ever", lol.
Click any graph to enlarge.
