The number of people out of the workforce last month exceeded 94 million for the sixth month in a row, according to new Department of Labor data released Friday.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that during the month of January 94,062,000 Americans were neither employed nor made any specific effort to find work in the prior four weeks.
The level of non-participation was down by 41,000 people in January compared to the previous month when 94,103,000 were not participating in the workforce. Last month was also 396,000 people less than September’s record 94,458,000 level of people out of the workforce,.
The labor force participation rate also increased by 0.1 percent over December’s rate. Though an improvement over the past several months, January’s 62.7 percent participation rate continued the trend of low participation levels not seen since the 1970s.
The civilian labor force grew by 502,000 people last month as well to 158,335,000. Overall 150,544,000 people were employed, 7,791,000 were unemployed and 5,973,000 wanted a job.
Additionally the economy added 151,000 in January and the unemployment rate remained stable at 4.9 percent.