Source: thefga.org Posted on 11/30/2021 7:43:14 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Why are so many jobs going unfilled? Where are all the workers?
As my PJ Media colleague Chris Queen reported on Saturday, “there are 10 job openings for every seven people seeking work” in America. But whyM even with offers of higher pay and better benefits, aren’t more workers getting off the couch and getting to work? The answer may lie in a complicated mixture of COVID fear, apathy, and financial pragmatism.
A new report by the Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA) found that even though the pandemic is waning in most states, most states’ pandemic welfare benefits are now so generous that it makes financial sense for many of the unemployed to stay home rather than work. In other words, welfare pays millions of Americans better than working.Source: thefga.org
“Some states took action to address this labor crisis by ending the expanded federal unemployment benefits and bonuses earlier than their scheduled expiration date,” the FGA reports. And in those states, more people went back to work. However, the American economy continues to struggle because “COVID-19 has become an excuse to create and expand welfare programs that discourage work.”
Since the pandemic began, the U.S. Congress has “pumped nearly $5 trillion taxpayer dollars into COVID-19 ‘relief’ spending.” These programs have offered very little relief to the economy and have instead conditioned people to expect “regular monthly payments that, when combined, are far more lucrative than work.” These exorbitantly expensive welfare initiatives have “infected several significant government programs and threaten to tank the American economy” entirely.
Source: thefga.org
Here’s a sampling of just a few of the government welfare programs that have been expanded since the pandemic began:
(Excerpt) Read more at pjmedia.com ...
Child Tax Credits: The value of the child tax credit is now larger than “the most generous cash welfare payment that [a single parent with two dependents] family could receive.” It “has become welfare—with no incentive or requirement to work.”
Food Stamps: The Biden Administration has unilaterally—and potentially unlawfully—expanded welfare, “implementing the single-largest permanent increase in food stamp benefits in the history of the program.” Payouts are up 25% since before the pandemic and “with the indefinite suspension of work requirements” and the hike in benefits awarded, the program “has become an even greater trap for government dependency.”
ObamaCare Subsidies: “Since ObamaCare subsidies are usually distributed on an advanced basis to offset monthly premiums,” the pandemic expansions under the Biden Administration “are yet another extension of the welfare state into the lives of millions of Americans.”
Medicaid: States that accepted additional federal “Medicaid funds during the pandemic are blocked from raising cost-sharing, changing eligibility, or removing anyone from their Medicaid rolls—even if they have become ineligible.” This means there are now millions of Americans who “are ‘locked-in’ to Medicaid coverage that they no longer qualify for.”
All of these welfare programs has encouraged “the quiet growth of the welfare state” and they are holding back America’s economic recovery.
Even my liberal inlaws agree that the free money is keeping people from working, but they can’t bring themselves to criticize J0bama.
Oddly, the lame stream fails to notice there is a YUGE difference between ‘unemployment claims’ and ‘unemployment’. IIRC there are over 10 million positions open. We see signs daily for help wanted. Few takers.
I can’t imagine America’s giant debt-wracked, printed money, statist-welfare government and empire surviving much longer in its present form, but I can’t imagine what replaces it, either. The rest of the world is even worse.
A little misleading. That first graphic doesn’t show that the minimum wage person can also get almost all of those other benefits, and the median wage person can get many of them.
I don’t disagree that we are creating incentives not to work, but we still need to present accurate information when discussing it.
This also creates a huge incentive for folks to quietly develop an off the books (preferably cash) side hustle that would not show up as “employed” in any statistics and could not be used to deny them any benefits.
As the underground economy increases economic data becomes much more unreliable and just weird.
Tried to order from my local KFC a few nights ago (kids like it and I had relative visiting).
Ordered from this joint many times. Got the message “no drivers available.” Same with the next place I tried, the third said “no delivery available.” Never seen that before, I assumed it’s b/c Über Eats couldn’t find enough staff.
I’ve also noticed lots and lots of working-aged people in the mall and stores during working hours, more than I’ve ever seen.
Tried to order from my local KFC a few nights ago (kids like it and I had relative visiting).
Ordered from this joint many times. Got the message “no drivers available.” Same with the next place I tried, the third said “no delivery available.” Never seen that before, I assumed it’s b/c Über Eats couldn’t find enough staff.
I’ve also noticed lots and lots of working-aged people in the mall and stores during working hours, more than I’ve ever seen.
Don’t be so sure about the rest of the world being worst. You are thinking in historical measures. We are circling the drain much faster than people realize. In a few years, there might be 20 or more countries that would be better than here.
If the signs said “we pay cash and this will be off the books” many employers would be flooded with applicants.
My oldest just got a job for $13.00 per hour at Walgreens stocking shelves and working in the photo lab. The Burger King down the road is offering a $500.00 sign on bonus. That sign has been up for a week or so now. Unreal...
No more arbitrarily setting a wage. Pay market wages like you do FOR EVERYTHING ELSE NEEDED TO RUN A BUSINESS.
Even more if they had “NO VAX OR MASKS REQUIRED!” signs posted.
I got a $5,000 bonus plus moving expenses in 1994 for IT work.
Boo hoo Chamber of Wage Slavery. It’s a seller’s market for labor. DEAL WITH IT. ‘bout time. Been 30 years since the last time.
Sysco has warehouse positions with $7,500 signing bonus
Get back on the fry machine, central_va—we have customers queued up in the drive-thru.
That was a "normal" sign on bonus amount back in 1995.
It’s a seller’s market for labor. DEAL WITH IT.
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