Background: In earlier versions the option was available for the entire layout but not for a story in the layout.
Solution:
To display the count of words in a layout or a story,select Utilities > Word and Character count > Layout/Story
The Word Count area displays the number of total and unique words in the layout/story
The Character Count area displays the total number of characters and specific language characters.
Private use Characters are unique characters specified within a range of Unicode Character set by individuals, organizations, and software vendors outside the ISO and Unicode Consortium.