One reason Americans are fatter than ever might seem to be sloth, except for the fact that 60% of the population worked in both 1979 and 2022 but the average work week dropped by just one hour over the period

According to the CDC, obesity is most severe among those of late middle-age, so if you can prevent it before then you are more likely to escape it later:

The prevalence of severe obesity was highest among adults aged 40–59 compared with other age groups.

Peak Baby Boom turned 40 in 1997.

Americans worked 32.61 hours per week on average in 1979 and 31.57 hours in 2022

All countries in 2016 with 30% of population or more obese

60% of the US population was working in both 1979 and 2022

Average weekly hours for 80% of workers quarterly, post-Great Recession, has never recovered to pre-recession cyclical high of 33.9 and is as low now as when Trump was inaugurated

The coming recession is evident from the change to the index for weekly hours, which hit a new low for this cycle in 3Q2019

April 2019: 882K dropped out of labor force, labor force contracted 726K, employment level contracted 103K, participation rate fell to 62.8% (the 2016 average), average weekly hours so far in 2019 down 0.4 from 2018 average

Data.

Data.

Data.

Data.

Data.

But other than that it's an economic boom because total nonfarm is up 263K.

From the point of view of total hours worked, this is the worst jobs recovery on record

Unemployment rate remains at 6.7% in March, average year over year job growth slows to 183k monthly, weekly hours recover

The BLS reports here:

"Total nonfarm payroll employment rose by 192,000 in March, and the unemployment rate was unchanged at 6.7 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Employment grew in professional and business services, in health care, and in mining and logging. ... Job growth averaged 183,000 per month over the prior 12 months. ... The average workweek for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls increased by 0.2 hour in March to 34.5 hours, offsetting a net decline over the prior 3 months."

-------------------------------------------------

While total nonfarm private payrolls have finally beaten the 1/1/08 peak (by just 96,000 jobs), rising to 116.07 million, neither seasonally-adjusted nor not-seasonally-adjusted total nonfarm employment has yet to surpass the pre-recession peak. Strapped municipalities and states find it difficult to add to government payrolls with reduced revenues due to on-going unemployment and reduced real estate values.

In 2013 job growth's pace averaged 194,000 monthly, which means at the current year over year pace of 183,000 monthly job growth has slowed 5.7% in 2014 to date.

Rising length of the work week arrests a worrisome downtrend for the time being.

Like The Size Of The Civilian Labor Force, Average Weekly Hours Have Stopped Their Recovery

Edward Lazear for The Wall Street Journal here has called attention to two months of back to back declines in average weekly hours, using the seasonally adjusted figures.

average weekly hours, not seasonally adjusted, quarterly average

It got me to looking at the not seasonally adjusted figures, which do not show the same thing. In fact, they show that we've been flirting with the 34.3 level quite a bit in 2013, but also even since before the Great Recession, and before ObamaCare and the recent spate of nasty winter weather. But what is interesting is that the quarterly average of the figures shows that we failed to make a new high in average weekly hours last summer, breaking a pattern of ever higher highs in 2010, 2011 and 2012 which had developed after the lows in late 2009, early 2010. You'll also notice a pattern had developed of higher lows in the measure at the beginning of 2011 and 2012,  but broken at the beginning of 2013.

civilian labor force level, not seasonally adjusted

This is interesting because you can see this same pattern in the level of the civilian labor force. The post-recession level bottomed at the beginning of 2011 and made higher lows at the turn both to 2012 and 2013, but not to 2014, which appears to signify more than seasonal shrinkage. Similarly there's been a pattern of ever higher highs in the summers in 2011, 2012 and 2013, but if the pattern doesn't hold in the summer as it hasn't in the winter, we'll not beat the 2013 summer level in the summer of 2014.

It stands to reason that as the civilian labor force recovers and grows, which it has, average weekly hours should rise, which they have, until recently. But the recent weakness in hours probably goes hand in hand with recent weakness in the size of the labor force, not with something else, like ObamaCare or the weather. And that probably has more to do with flagging demand in the economy than anything else.

Average Weekly Hours For Everyone Up 1.5% Since ObamaCare Passed

If ObamaCare has been cutting hours for the workforce in sectors, it's not showing up overall. Average weekly hours for all employees are up 1.5% since March 2010, when the bill was rammed down our throats in a completely partisan vote. The sectors impacted, like retail and fast food, simply aren't big enough to drag down the overall picture.

Average Weekly Hours Haven't Been "Full-Time" For 12 Back-To-Back Months Since 4/'80

The last time average weekly hours averaged full-time, that is, 35 hours or above, for 12 consecutive months or more was in April 1980.

Government Statistics Will NEVER Capture The ObamaCare "Part-Timing" Trend

The long term trend in average weekly hours is down, down, down.

And the reason is simple and devious by design, in order to escape detection: Anyone working less than 35 hours is already part-time as far as the government statistical agency, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, is concerned, so if hours are reduced from say 34 to 29 to comply with ObamaCare's new definition of part-time, that will never show up in the part-time numbers because that will not make the slightest bit of difference. People working 34 hours were already part-time as far as the BLS is concerned, so if they are cut back to 29 they will still be so. 

The BLS here defines full-time as 35 hours or more per week, and part-time as anything less than 35:

"[Part-time] Refers to those who worked 1 to 34 hours during the survey reference week and excludes employed persons who were absent from their jobs for the entire week."

This is a well known fact. But it is little appreciated that as ObamaCare deviously defines full-time as 30 hours or more, that will by definition not make a difference to the BLS' statistical presentation, which doesn't begin counting full-time until hours are 35 or more.

It's as if the 30 hour rule were designed to exploit the bureaucratic inertia behind the different definition and fly under its radar.

The only way we'll be able to observe the perverse scaling back of employee hours is in the hours statistics. Unfortunately, the long-term trend in hours is down, down, and down, and it will be difficult to detect the new downward trend within the old downward trend. Besides, average weekly hours are up since ObamaCare passed, obviously because the economy is slowly improving from a great deficit, ObamaCare notwithstanding. Average weekly hours are actually up 2% since ObamaCare passed.

The Senate healthcare bill, like the Senate itself since the passage of the 17th Amendment, is a Trojan Horse meant to destroy the country as we once knew it. It were almost better if the Senate no longer existed, and the House expanded to the proportions it had formerly before the Reapportionment Act of 1929, itself a grievous offense against the liberties of the people.

Average weekly hours are up 2% since ObamaCare passed.

Consumers Increase Spending in 2011 From Savings and Social Security Tax Holiday

Net real retail spending looks set to come in up 2.9 percent in 2011 over 2010.

Per the data here from the Census.

Average monthly retail and food expenditures in 2010 came to $363 billion per month, or $4.4 trillion overall.

Through October 2011 average monthly retail and food expenditures are running at $389 billion per month, or $4.7 trillion annualized.

That's a 6.8 percent increase so far, or about $26 billion more per month.

Less inflation running at 3.9 percent, the net real increase appears to be 2.9 percent.

$billions monthly

Unfortunately, about $14 billion of the $26 billion nominal monthly increase could be attributed to a reprieve on Social Security taxation of 2 percentage points on employee compensation running at an annualized rate of $8.3 trillion as of October. That extra money in paychecks is simply being spent.

Where did the remaining $12 billion per month come from?

From savings.

The savings rate has plummeted since January, from a rate of 4.9 percent to 3.5 percent. In January we were saving nearly $47 billion per month, but now only $33 billion, a difference of $14 billion per month.

Add the pernicious work of inflation on top of all that, and the rosy scenario of increased consumer spending doesn't look so good after all, especially since incomes are stagnant to falling. Hours worked year over year are flat, and real average hourly earnings overall are down 1.6 percent, according to the BLS here.

When the Social Security tax holiday expires on December 31, there will be less money available to spend, automatically. Robbing from Social Security for such temporary gains is a gimmick, but don't underestimate the politicians' and the voters' eagerness to repeat it under these grim circumstances. They'll take the money, even if it means saving less, because they need it.

Weekly Standard: Income Growth Has Slowed and Gone Negative in August?

See the figures, especially in Table 1 here, at the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

After reaching a peak in July, August personal income fell below that of July, but is still higher than personal income was in June, and January.

The Weekly Standard is making much of the steady decline in income growth so far in 2011 here, but without once mentioning the boost to incomes the temporary reduction in the payroll tax was supposed to supply.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics here, average weekly hours have been stagnant for a year, so income gains cannot be coming from more hours worked. In fact, all other things being equal, you would expect nominal income to remain the same. Which is to say, no one is getting much of a raise, but they still have jobs.

But here the BLS shows that average weekly earnings have increased 1.85 percent year over year in August 2011.

Hm.

Interestingly enough, the difference between a payroll tax of 6.25 percent on $100 of income and 4.25 percent on $100 of income is . . . $1.82 less tax, going straight into people's paychecks.

And after 7 months in 2011, using the seasonally adjusted annual numbers of the BEA, income is up 1.94 percent, including the downtick in August.

1.85, 1.82, 1.94 . . . looks like a pattern to me.

Nominal incomes are up slightly in consequence of the payroll tax cut. Otherwise, it's a stagnant income picture, just like the unemployment picture.

Unless of course you factor in CPI and discuss real incomes. But that's a whole other, and very real, problem.

Actually, Obama is Less Than Zero

"In fact, in some ways the report was less than zero in that weekly hours fell, as did hourly earnings."

-- Heidi Shierholz, quoted here

Net Zero Jobs Created in August, First Time Since World War Two

As reported here:

It was the first time since World War II that the economy had precisely net zero jobs created for a month. ...

[J]ob creation in July, which originally came in better than expected, actually wasn't as good as thought. The 117,000 jobs originally announced was cut to 85,000, while June's number fell from 46,000 to a mere 20,000. That makes four consecutive months of sub-100,000 job growth when most economists believe that 150,000 is the minimum number needed to reduce the unemployment rate meaningfully.

"Though much attention is being paid to ‘zero job growth’ in August, the real news in today’s numbers is that job growth is worse than in recent months, and the nation continues to produce far fewer jobs than needed to meaningfully reduce the unemployment rate," Heidi Shierholz, economist at the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, D.C., said in a statement. "In fact, in some ways the report was less than zero in that weekly hours fell, as did hourly earnings."

Average hourly earnings slid 3 cents to $23.09 while average weekly hours edged lower to 34.2.

Headline unemployment remains at 9.1 percent. The broader measure is at 16.2 percent, while the number of unemployed persons not counted in the numbers actually grew significantly.

Follow the link for all the details.