93,671,000 Americans 16 or older did not participate in the nation’s labor force in calendar year 2015

Ali Meyer writes at Washington Free Beacon,

A record average of 93,671,000 Americans 16 or older did not participate in the nation’s labor force in calendar year 2015, and the average labor force participation rate was 62.7 percent, a 38-year low, according to data released Friday from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).

The 93,671,000 Americans not in the labor force in 2015 are those individuals who did not have a job and did not actively seek one. There were 1,646,000 more individuals not in the labor force in 2015 than there was in the year prior.

The average unemployment rate in 2015 was 5.3 percent which declined from 2014’s average of 6.2 percent. This measure does not account for those individuals who have dropped out of the labor force. The unemployment rate simply measures the percent of those who did not have a job, but actively sought one over the month.

Read more here.