Is there any good data on what age groups are quitting their jobs at the highest rates or levels, this year?

please stay at Atlantic

haha, i will

nah, all the data compilers have quit

I’d be shocked if it didn’t increase exponentially after age 50

Unfortunately not. JOLTS data doesn’t collect info on the employee. The J2J data does, but isn’t available for this year yet.

dammit! but thank you for saving me an hour of worthless googling

anything to infer from glancing at LFPRs by age?

I don’t think so. Not a strict relationship there.

Of course. One of my (work) life’s great laments is that detailed data on this is so lagged

Was it Nick or @ModeledBehavior who long ago said for a one-time $10M infusion, JOLTS could be upgraded substantially?

That sounds like Bunker content

I believe that was me sharing something I had seen in an Obama era budget proposal. I think?

what about using CPS data?

CPS question on E to E flows has some selection issues & likely undercounts job to job moves. FMP have an approach to rectify the issue, but they only publicly share national average of their E-E rate cpb-us-w2.wpmucdn.com/campuspress.ya…

thanks, i'd seen this paper but haven't read it yet.

I've never used the J2J data, but it does appear to be available through Q2 of 2021. It looks like it hasn't been loaded into J2J Explorer though.

Oh wow, that's what I get for double checking using the explorer! Thanks for flagging

oh, no wait, the 2021 date is for when it was uploaded. The data is still just through Q2 2020!

Oh man, of course! Foiled by Census directory naming schemes.

I think also interesting and more relevant is to look by education level. I'd bet high school & below have a much higher quit rate than any other demo and more significant than age

??

Retirement age and early retirement numbers are pretty high

This isn't a population defined by age, but defined by level of personal financial gain from economic safety nets implemented in response to the pandemic---including enhanced unemployment benefits and suspension of rent payments. The government is enabling refusal to work.

Can someone plz help me square the circle on how these ppl can quit? UI supplements are gone. Inflation is up We have a mediocre saftey net & Americans have little cash savings (much less retirement) outside of hone equity How are ppl making ends meet?

IDK. Only guess is it’s that easy to be self employed now 🤷‍♂️

The past year HAS seen much higher rates of savings. But also, there's plenty of businesses that ARE willing to advertise higher wages. Presumably there's intra-sector migration in that sense.

If that were true we’d see the U6 number going up vs falling to its lowest level since 1975

I mean I guess you’re talking about ppl in the market just switching jobs but still If you were low skill and on the sidelines, presumably seeing $20/hr Amazon fulfillment jobs would entice you but...that isn’t happening?

good question. what we know: quits are highest in leisure/hospitality/retail. conjecture: this is low-income work in a sector w/ lots of job openings. possible the ppl quitting aren't primary breadwinners and/or quitting to take another job imminently

the data fwiw bls.gov/news.release/j…

I have a notion that they are becoming off the books caretakers for children and the elderly for those working from home that need assistance caring for same.

It does not appear to be more people getting SSDI. ssa.gov/oact/STATS/dib…

this is my hypothesis as well. think about how many of those workers were part-time and have decided to care for kids or aging relatives now. people have savings, but are also spending less and have re-evaluated their lives. easier to live within means / on one income.

Right But on some level there’s a push pull? I.e. if you’re correct then it’s gonna be hard for outsized GDP growth (~8%) to happen Q2/3 2022 when Covid effectively ends? I just think “pent up demand” is incongruous w/ “ppl now living w/in means & fewer ppl in labor force”

I guess it really is down to higher savings. Either way, we've simultaneously seen a continual drop in unemployment, so it's probably a net benefit all around.

Clearly there's more money, better distributed, kicking around in US households than we believed

Honestly you’re prob right which is yet another reason I think that proposed IRS rule is bad news bears There’s prob a *ton* of cash (unreported, untaxed) propping up working class. It’s honestly better to just leave it be

Letting people cheat on their taxes is an odd take.

Eh, it fits w/ my (idiosyncratic) world view I think ppl Americans generally like rules & feel good hewing to them But minor rebellions are a deep part of our nat’l ethos and not being 100% honest on taxes is something a lot of ppl do (consciously or not) ((not me!))

If it was just about tax cheats, sure. But the IRS are bullies and it could easily turn into harassing working people over tiny sums of money.

Or there’s masssive growth in the self employed economy.

Again, supposedly ~4 million people willingly quit their jobs. Some are going to get a better job. Some are parents who are realizing the salary cut when canceled out by daycare cuts might be worth it. Others are people in their late 50’s+ who can retire.

I believe the JOLTS report doesn’t break out gender but my bet would be a big driver of the increase in quits is to take care of children, would expect then more women quitting as data shows child care affects them more

It also helps understand that a quit for that reason is balanced against not paying for child care either, so it isn’t an entire net loss

My guess is lots of people selling flavored vapes that are banned and not reporting it.

OnlyFans.

I assume the high quit rate simply reflects people switching jobs, so they don't really need UI or even much in the way of savings

I am 50 and quit my job of 8.5yrs I worked for a big tech company that had no growth potential amd considered us “essential” during a pandemic and what we did is no where near “essential”

Anecdotally, several Boomer neighbors have sold their $1m+ homes, bought black Mercedes vans or RVs, and are headed for parts unknown. Yesterday, one couple shared their “plan” which includes first visiting many wineries & breweries.

I think a deeper dive is needed. Is it rich kids quitting who live at home? It’s not easy to say I don’t want a steady income

If you write about this please lmk if you want to come on our pod to discuss your findings, why and how ppl are doing it. We have some insights due to our user base - but we bias 50+