Between 1984 and 2001, the U.S. government made it much easier to get disability payments and the number of disabled people more than doubled from 3.8 million to 7.7 million. Most of the people who try to qualify for disability payments have a tough time finding jobs, and spend a lot of time “out of work and actively searching for work.” Once people start receiving disability payments, however, they rarely work again and continue to get the disability payments for decades: These citizens then count as “out of the labor force.” What effect did reducing the requirements to get disability payments have on the unemployment rate?