This is one of my favorite concepts in United States’ economic data.

It cuts right to the inhumanity of it all.

Who is part of the Civilian Noninstitutional Population (CNP)?

Well, if you are at least sixteen years of age, not in the military, and not living in an institutional facility, … you are!

Why do we split it up as such?

It always feels like a dodge to me. When navigating this type of data, there are always these little exceptions that muddy the water, technically true and relevant, but with some dampening effect to the clarity and impact of the associated concepts.

In that regard, CNP represents one of many obstacles to a basic understanding of the U.S. economy.

Take for instance recent headlines about drops in the labor force. It doesn’t sound good, but the media perpetually throws out numbers without the context needed to understand them.

This is the beginning of a series of posts attempting to establish that context.

First we will consider the finite set of the U.S. population.

To find our labor force and understand its drop, this first cut divides our resident population by availability to join the labor force, which is basically what the Civilian Noninstitutional Population represents.

And yes, “Everyone Else” is overwhelmingly children (~94%), plus those in the military and institutions.

Notice anything funny about Everyone Else?

It has not been growing. Look at that timeline. In 1970 there were 67.9 million in the Everyone Else bucket versus a projected 68.2M in 2025, which is 0.4% growth for the period.

Over the same time, the Civilian Noninstitutional Population has roughly doubled from 137.2M to 273.8M, or 99.6% change overall.

What happened? Or what didn’t happen?

It would seem the widely publicized “baby boom” has been followed by a long, slow baby bust.

The baby boom’s impact peaked in this regard back in 1962.

Was the youth culture of the 1960s literally driven by the power of numbers?

It would seem then that the 1970s was not just a coming of age story for that lot, but one for the country as a whole as it began shifting to a heavier mix of adults, which has continued into the present.

Projected at 80% as of 2025, the CNP now outnumbers Everyone Else by 4 to 1, up from the 3 to 1 ratio breached in the 1980s.

If it feels less fun around here, you now know one more reason why.

And since the rest of this journey mainly focuses on breaking down CNP, let’s answer the question begging to be answered and quantify the kids in this story while we are here.

There’s your baby boom. From 40M kids to 60M in a little over a decade. It has basically been flat since, with a dip in the 1970-80s making it a little less unnerving to see that number sliding again now.

2025 America had basically the same number of kids as in 1966, except kids today have to deal with twice as many adults.

So it has gone.

Later we will get to the household data that might connect those kids with the adults dropping out of the labor force.

Next however we will break down the Civilian Noninstitutional Population into parts.

What percentage of those available to work are working? Who needs work and doesn’t have it? And how do those populations fit into the whole?