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We haven't set things up to give everyone personalized think tank support yet.

I'm not proposing personalized think tank support, merely in loco parentis. If a person is part of this "unable to make good choices" class, they get to live in an institutionalized environment where important choices are made for them. They don't make the choice to overconsume soda and other junk food (as the current poor do), they get to pick a few options off a menu in a healthy food cafeteria. They don't get to control their own TV, there's a TV that plays wholesome programming a couple of hours a day and they don't get to use it if they don't participate in exercise and productive labor. Etc.

In short, the setup my 2 year old lives with.

Looking for a job is a cost. You don't actually do anything productive to society while looking for a job.

Yes, searching for something isn't productive until you find it. But refusing to search is a great way to ensure that you won't find it.

Looking for full time work (or having a job) at least 27 weeks/year is a 97.3% effective way to avoid poverty in the US.

https://www.bls.gov/opub/reports/working-poor/2019/home.htm

In contrast, about 21% of people outside the labor force were poor. (28M poor people outside the labor force as per BLS report above) / (330M people x 40% outside the labor force).

For one I'm explicitly avoiding any claims about what the situation actually is on average, or on a case by case basis, because I don't actually know.

Why am I unsurprised you don't know? But it's actually not hard to know - it's pretty well documented that the situation is "drugs and video games are fun".

https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w23552/w23552.pdf https://qz.com/1070206/nearly-half-of-working-age-american-men-who-are-out-of-the-labor-force-are-using-painkillers-daily https://www.chicagobooth.edu/review/video-killed-radio-star

I suppose a theoretical alternative explanation is that jobs have suddenly become far more dangerous and people are becoming injured and turning to drugs to cope with pain. This change happened concurrently with the available jobs shifting away from factories/coal mines and towards air conditioned offices. Using a laptop is dangerous I guess!

In some cases, looking for a job is legitimately a waste of everyone's time, because the individual is worth little to employers and their time is worth more elsewhere. I'm not talking about playing video games here.

Perhaps you should speak plainly and be specific.