We Are Missing Seven Million Men

This missing person report won’t fit on a milk carton.

Economist Nicholas Eberstadt estimates that seven million American men of “prime employment age” are not coming in today. The labor participation rate bears out his estimate, as do the numerous employers scrounging for warm bodies.

They’re not working at a job, nor seeking one.

Video games, online porn and mind-numbing chemicals are on their to-do list.

They call the problem hikikomori in Japan, roughly “withdrawn from society”.

There, researchers at major universities see a link: plummeting testosterone levels. It’s been noted here in the states, too.

The docs say low-T can manifest itself in lower mental clarity, emotional instability, weak memory and focus.

Sounds like every mass shooter we’ve had recently, doesn’t it? But it also sounds heart-breakingly sad. A waste.

It’s funny how we keep hearing about, and crusading against “toxic masculinity”—when the actual crisis is the opposite.

I don’t know how much of this phenomenon is environmental—food additives, water pollution, the omnipresence of electronics?

Or how much of it might stem from, or be reinforced in, the popular culture.

Doesn’t it seem like we should be a LOT more curious about seven million missing young men?