- More than 9 million people in the U.S. remain without work, even though open job listings are higher than before the pandemic hit.
- Job seekers say the wages being offered by employers in the post-lockdown job market are simply too low.
- The worker shortage is hitting everyone from restaurants to travel to manufacturers, as they try to hire back after historic layoffs during the pandemic lockdown.
Companies eager to open their doors to capitalize on vaccinated and eager customers are having trouble finding workers — which means consumers should expect longer wait times, delays in service, and higher prices overall, labor economists warn, reports NBC News.
Shortage of workers
“The reason that there are so many openings is that they do not pay a living wage,” said one job seeker.
The worker shortage is hitting everyone from restaurants to travel to manufacturers, as they try to hire back after historic layoffs during the pandemic lockdown and downturn, and are now struggling to meet surging consumer demand.
Expect “worse service in affected industries: wait times at restaurants, retail, housing renovations and the like,” Austan Goolsbee, economics professor at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and former economic adviser to President Barack Obama, told NBC News in an email.
Low wages
Job seekers say the wages being offered by employers in the post-lockdown job market are simply too low.
“They can’t literally scoop up folks at the end of their rope without assuming anything beyond bare minimum pay,” said Atlanta resident John Huston, 59, a former senior marketing associate. “The reason that there are so many openings is that they do not pay a living wage.”
Huston said he’s been having trouble finding work in his field after he and a colleague were edged out of their positions and replaced by three entry-level workers.
“I can’t find anything that pays close to what I had before,” said Huston, who has an MBA. “Once they see me on Zoom, I’m suddenly overqualified or they insist I’d be bored at the job.”
All he can find are entry-level manual labor positions. One job offer he rejected paid $12 an hour delivering auto parts, using his own car and paying his own expenses. The other paid the same, lifting heavy loads in a refrigerated warehouse. He might consider them, however, if the hourly pay were at least $15 and covered expenses.
Low employment rates
Data released Thursday by the Department of Labor shows that first-time weekly jobless claims fell for the second week, hitting the lowest level since the pandemic began. However, more than 9 million people in the U.S. remain without work, even though open job listings are higher than before the pandemic hit.
“The participation rate fell much more sharply than usual during the recent downturn, suggesting there are millions of workers waiting for the end of the pandemic — or the emergence of job opportunities — to jump back into the labor market,” Justin Wolfers,
The answer
Professor of Economics and Public Policy at the University of Michigan, said in an email.
One way to help fix that, economists say, is to raise the pay.
“The worker shortage will go away because wages will rise,” Jeffrey Miron, director of economics studies at the Cato Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based libertarian think tank, said in an email. “And then consumer prices will follow.”
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Source: NBC News
