I really hate the framing of the "Labor Shortage" narrative in general. Does supply and demand only work one way?<p>The Citations Needed podcast did an interesting episode on this kind of framing.[0] Although they skew heavily toward the left so take it with a grain of salt.<p>I'm curious to see if the heightened unemployment benefits act as a new de facto minimum wage law, but I have a feeling everything will be cut to try and force people back into the labor force before anything super interesting happens.<p>[0]
<a href="https://citationsneeded.medium.com/episode-135-the-labor-shortage-ruse-how-capital-invents-staffing-crises-to-bust-unions-and-fb42448a7e23" rel="nofollow">https://citationsneeded.medium.com/episode-135-the-labor-sho...</a>
This is a very surprising number given the expectations. There are many companies hiring in the service sector that cannot find enough workers. As such, average hours worked is skyrocketing as well:<p><a href="https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AWHAELAH" rel="nofollow">https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AWHAELAH</a><p>It seems likely that unemployment benefits are contributing to this labor shortage.
_The Lie of ‘No One Wants to Work’_<p><a href="https://www.eater.com/22417344/restaurant-labor-shortage-covid-19-unemployment-benefits-risks" rel="nofollow">https://www.eater.com/22417344/restaurant-labor-shortage-cov...</a><p>Restaurant workers in particular are facing higher risk for less pay (fewer customers == fewer tips), and working conditions in restaurants were already terrible.<p>From the article : “We are so sick and tired of [restaurant owners] assuming we want a handout. We want to work, but we also want to be treated like human beings. We haven’t been for way too long.”
I'm not sure what to think about the current situation. My wife and other local business owners I've spoken with over the last couple of months (we live on Cape Cod) are having a hard time hiring people, and they're all offering a minimum of $15-$16/hr. If the worker shortage continues, it'll compound in the summer with the tourist season, especially if the typical seasonal workers aren't available due to travel restrictions (many are international).<p>We're also having trouble with schools and daycares that've become used to closing at 3-4 pm and are unlikely to return to staying open until 5-5:30 pm.<p>It'll be interesting to see the long-term effects of this accidental experiment over the last year of UBI/shorter work hours. We're lucky enough to afford a nanny to fill the gaps along with family, but I have no idea how other people do it. Part of me hopes it's just the additional family duties and increased unemployment benefits keeping people temporarily out of the workforce for now and not a permanent trend of preferred underemployment. It's been tough seeing so many local businesses go under over the last year.
This article is not great: the entirety is like 10 bullet points with very little analysis. There has to be a better source than link at the top (WaPo's analysis seems pretty solid).<p>Looking at the graph though, I'm curious: why did forecasters expect a huge vertical jump in April instead of a continuation of the trend from the month before, especially with all the small businesses that went under last year.
I am worried for the US economy.<p>Dogecoin, a meme and joke, went from a quarter of a cent last year to 66 cents today.<p>And the second most popular job in today payrolls were Casino workers, at an staggering 72k people.<p>Something must be seriously wrong when people think it is wise to dump money on memes and casinos!
I've pretty much stopped paying attention to these numbers. I read/listen to multiple sources of news, and the amount of vastly different interpretations of these numbers has me concluding that its pointless to give a damn.
I was making $12/hour as a bus boy at a restaurant in the 90s. $15/hour is pathetic. Target is _starting_ at $15/hour in the rural midwest, near me.<p>Yes, maybe their restaurant (and other biz) margins are small but they're business people, get creative. Biz is not entitled to cheap labor.<p>Adjust prices, raise wages, have managers do work.<p>This is the first time in decades I've heard of labor having an actual choice.<p>People should be able to be picky about what job they want to work. Do you want to work a service job during COVID? Pay is crap, people are crap to employees, and you get the chance of getting a deadly virus. Sign me up!
Any claims about labor shortage, hiring difficulties, "no one wants to work", etc. should always be read with the automatic addendum "...at the price we want to pay".
That's some pretty strong spin... Unnamed forecasters thought the number of jobs added should be higher, so we're disappointed by a quarter million new jobs.
It's likely there are few quality jobs available.<p>A friend who was a waiter is not going back to work because her salary depends (75% of it) on tips, however many households switched to food delivery services.<p>Once people start going to restaurants again, in large enough numbers, employees who depend on tips will return. Base salary for servers is peanuts otherwise.
Looking at the chart, it has exactly the appearance I would expect. Re-employment after some kind of sudden downtrend would display the same behavior as fuel prices at retail gas stations I would think. That is to say a steep change followed by a slow movement in the other direction.
Since a lot of policy was based off of these employment forecasts which turned out to be way off, what are the expected adjustments to the policies in place?
The math here is simple. Economy = vaccination rate. People aren’t getting vaccinated so we can’t return to business as usual. People who claim it’s about incentives like wages or unemployment pay are imposing their agenda on the facts. It’s all about vaccinations at this point. We vaccinate everyone or get stagflation.
My honest opinion is the hard working professionals making 150-350k are getting hosed. Pay the majority of taxes in this country so that other people can loot, riot, and collect welfare. Asset prices debasing everyone’s wage due to rampant money printing, and they won’t stop. Money printing is a tax on the professional class. Being a hard working professional in this country is losing its allure, and is increasingly a suckers bet.<p>“ Work hard! Don’t worry if we print money and triple the cost of your house and new mortgage! You are in the top 15%! Look your class only pays 20% of the taxes, never mind all that money we printed! It’s not a tax!”<p>There’s a serious level of subversion about what’s going on economically in this country.