New research shows that teenagers – 16-to-19-year-olds – are working less than in the past. During the mid-1970s, 68 percent of 18-to-19-year-old teens and more than half of younger teens were in the labor force for at least a part of each year. From that time until today, teen labor force participation has declined. It is now at its lowest point since World War II.³

Source: School of Business and Economics, Indiana University Northwest

Teens historically have been the last ones in line to get jobs, so the slow growth of employment since the recession of 2001 may mean there simply are fewer jobs being offered to them. But several other factors also come into play.

The chart compares the labor force participation rates of teens and adults ages 55 through 64 in a recent six-year period. Clearly, teen participation has dropped while participation by older adults has risen. The research shows an increase in labor force participation by people 65 years and older too. The older group has a lower rate (15.4 percent in 2006), but participation among these individuals has increased by 19.4 percent in just the past six years. So one reason fewer teens are employed now than in the past is, evidently, that older workers are taking the jobs that teens used to hold. Immigrants figure into this as well, but are not depicted in the chart.

This explanation alone is not complete, however. If teens wanted, they could still be in the labor force as unemployed job seekers. Instead, far fewer of them are in the labor force at all. The authors of the research suggest that higher school enrollment – especially in summer school – explains where the teens have gone. They say that the teen participation rate is especially low in states with the most generous scholarship policies.⁴

While school enrollment and older workers explain much of the change reported here, our conversations with employers suggest that workplace skill requirements add another factor. Since the 1970s, many of the jobs that teens used to do now require more skill or experience than teens have or credentials teens cannot obtain. This, too, explains why fewer teens are active in the workplace today than in the past.

3 “Understanding the Decline in the Labor Force Participation of Teenagers,” Donald A. Coffin, associate professor of economics, School of Business and Economics, Indiana University Northwest, October 2007.

4 Ibid, p. 7.