Men Without Meaning
28th July 2026
A curious paradox sits at the heart of many advanced economies. Employers complain constantly about labour shortages. Governments respond by importing record numbers of migrants to fill vacancies. Yet at the same time, a growing number of men have quietly withdrawn from work altogether.
These men are not showing up in unemployment queues or appearing in dramatic economic statistics. In many cases, they are not even looking for jobs. Instead, they exist in a liminal space between participation and withdrawal, cycling through gig work, periods of welfare dependence, disability payments, online entertainment and increasingly isolated lives.
The phenomenon is most pronounced in the United States, where male labour-force participation has been declining for decades, particularly among men without university degrees.
Feminist complaints about ‘patriarchy’ appear to be illusionary.