Fallible Statistics

The Times had an article yesterday on men who've dropped out of the labor force.
Men Not Working, and Not Wanting Just Any Job.

It raised some questions:

• we compare favorably to European nations on unemployment rates. Would the comparison change if we used the percentage of the population working? Do all nations use the same rules to create unemployment statistics?
• is this relevant (I assume yes) to the question of immigration's effect on US workers? (See comment on a Marginal Revolution post on a new academic analysis. Presumably it is--perhaps US workers don't drop down the status ladder to get work as much as they used to because the bottom is filled in?
• is the phenomena related to the general social disdain of "low class" work and greater concern for status?
  

The article observed that some men lose contact with society as they reach their 40's and 50's, particularly the unmarried/childless ones. I suspect that's always been true. Maiden aunts would care for children and oldsters; bachelor uncles would sit further from the fire.