It’s been called America’s “quiet catastrophe.”

Millions of men, believing they have nothing constructive to contribute to themselves, their families or their communities, have faded out of the labor force, and out of the country’s consciousness. A massive army, choosing to be idle and dependent, is a testament to the collapse of the belief in work, and to cultivating an independent life.

Work which brings value and purpose – even purpose as basic as providing food, clothing and shelter to yourself and your loved ones – is foundational to individual lives and to society.

The percentage of men in the labor force has been declining for decades. And, chances are, you’ve never heard a word about this downward trend.

A new report from Common Sense Institute scholars Tamra Ryan and Cole Anderson put a spotlight on this problem in Colorado.

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Though the labor force participation rate has risen for women to the highest rates ever recorded, for men it is historically low at about 89%. CSI points out if the participation rate had just stayed level since 2007, there would be 23,000 more men in the Colorado workforce, the “equivalent of losing one-third of a graduating class of high school seniors” statewide.

These men, sitting on the sidelines, depend wholly on support provided by the work of a girlfriend or spouse, their parents or grandparents – or the generosity of taxpayers.

For these men, the safety net has become a hammock.

This is not a new development.

Nicholas Eberstadt, a highly respected scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, brought national attention to this issue in his landmark and very powerful book “Men Without Work.”

“The detachment of ever-larger numbers of adult men from the reality and routines of regular paid labor poses a self-evident threat to our nation’s future prosperity,” he wrote. “It can only result in lower living standards, greater economic disparities, and slower economic growth than we might otherwise expect.”

One shocking statistic Eberstadt cites crystallizes this crisis. The work rate for men aged 25 to 54 (the prime working years) is slightly lower than it was at the tail end of the Great Depression in 1940. Most people look at the Depression era as one of bleak, hopeless times, and yet – for millions – it’s worse now.

This should produce an outcry. Yet when is the last time legislators at the State Capitol, or in Washington D.C., sounded an alarm that, as a society, we are allowing millions of employable men to be ignored, and treated as disposable?  We turn away as they fade into their couch cushions, staring at screens while binge watching television or playing video games or, worse, existing in a haze of drug and/or alcohol addiction.

The answers are complicated, defying the usual talking-point solutions driven by the right or the left.

Let’s be clear: a collapse in the job market hasn’t driven them out of the workforce. Nor are they home caring for a child, for example. As CSI and others have detailed, for every prime-age man seeking employment, four others are not working – or even looking for work. This comes at the time of labor shortage in Colorado, with more than two jobs available for every person looking for work. So sparking economic growth and job creation won’t do the trick.

Nor do we need more social programs as progressives might prescribe. In fact, the reliance by many of these men on supposedly temporary disability programs for permanent income support argues for a tightening of employment requirements – not loosening them.

The causes are more subtle, and the trends decades long. Clearly, the disintegration of family structures, (including the rise in the number of absent fathers), the falling away from faith communities and the widening of access to and, expansion of, benefits in state and federal welfare programs are contributing factors.

The invisibility of these men does not diminish the tragedy of their idleness and the corrosive effects of it on their lives and the lives of those who depend on them. Our state and nation cannot be considered healthy, no matter the economic trends, if we allow the lives of millions of men – a group far larger than all of Colorado – to atrophy into meaninglessness.

It is a drain on the treasury, for sure. But more importantly it is a drain on humanity.

Sean Duffy, a former deputy chief of staff to Gov. Bill Owens, is a communications and media relations strategist and ghostwriter based in the Denver area.