While some employers may be struggling to hire for one reason or another, economists say generous unemployment benefits are not the cause.
As the U.S. economy bounces back from the COVID-induced downturn, some employers say they’re having a hard time finding workers. When the COVID lockdowns started in 2020, millions of workers were losing their jobs every week, and nobody knew how bad things would get. But a few weeks after the initial lockdowns, businesses started recalling workers, millions returned to their jobs despite the extra benefits, and the jobless rate plunged.
A spate of academic studies found the extra benefits weren’t stopping people from going back to work after all. It’s true that the benefits amount to more than prior wages for some workers. It’s just that the extra money doesn’t seem to have held workers back. Economists say that if demand for workers were exceeding supply, then the price of labor would be shooting up. But as Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said in late April, overall wage growth hasn’t increased. “We don’t see wages moving up yet, and presumably we would see that in a really tight labor market,” Powell said at a press conference. “And we may well start to see that.” For now, unemployment remains elevated, at 6%, compared to 3.5% before the pandemic, and there were 4 million more unemployed people in March 2021 than in February 2020. That data reflects people who are trying to find jobs, not those who have removed themselves from the workforce for a number of reasons, like a lack of child care.
Yet some business owners still say there are no willing workers out there. The loudest complaints of a worker shortage now seem to come from restaurants, as more people resume their pre-pandemic dining-out habits thanks to widespread vaccination. Wages may have risen a bit faster than average this year in the hospitality industry, according to the government’s employment cost index, though state minimum wage laws may have played a role. In general, restaurant work doesn’t pay very much, with median wages around $11 for servers in 2020, compared to more than $20 across all occupations. Many restaurant jobs are also much different than they used to be, with more outside seating, for example, plus masks and new cleaning protocols. Not to mention new risks of getting sick.
Some restaurant workers recently told Eater that they are willing to work; they just want pay that reflects the hazards.
Arthur Delaney and Dave Jamieson
Huffington Post