A Record Number of Americans Left Jobs for Labor-Force Sidelines in October

U.S. labor force participation has been having a good run, but it slipped in October -- possibly as demographics exacted a toll.

The participation rate had been trending up as people moved into the labor force and as workers with jobs hung onto them. Last month, however, the rate fell as 5.2 million employees dropped straight out of the labor market -- the biggest number since the series started in 1990. That could have been a hurricane-induced change that will reverse as the effect of storms that slammed the southern U.S. abates. Or it could have happened as workers returned to school or retired.