Posted on 06/17/2016 4:08:44 AM PDT by expat_panama
Throughout the seven-year old U.S. expansion, as the unemployment rate tumbled from a peak of 10% in 2009 to a low of 4.7% last month, policy makers have been focused on the slack in the labor market. Yes, slack....
...surprise to read this week that the problem facing companies is a shortage of workers, both highly skilled and entry-level.
Why not offer them a higher wage?...
...the Roaring ‘90s? That’s what a tight labor market looks like: signing bonuses; offers of free cars, even for mid-level managers; and a sufficiently attractive wage to entice some criminals...
...plenty of business owners who will tell you that they can’t find workers...
...Janet Yellen on Wednesday cast doubt on a significant interest-rate increase in the near future...
...monthly JOLTS report (Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey) revealed a record number of job openings...
...Can’t businesses tempt labor-force dropouts with a higher real wage? There is no sign of it....
...a wishy-washy attempt to fill the reported number of job openings.
Many economists have been waiting for that beast known as “wage inflation” to boost prices...
...Businesses do not bid up the price of labor (wages) only to find their profits squeezed...
...A more compelling argument to explain the large number of reported job openings going unfilled is that demand isn’t strong enough to support economy-wide price increases...
...6.4 million Americans working part-time for economic reasons...
...wake of the truly awful May employment report, did Yellen concede...
...pointed to the low level of unemployment claims, high level of job openings and modest wage increases as signs “of a healthy labor market.”
Maybe. Until I see signs that businesses are satisfying their stated demand for labor by luring labor-market dropouts with a higher real wage, I remain unconvinced.
(Excerpt) Read more at marketwatch.com ...
This is becoming a nightmare problem in Colora-doh. I’ve been personally told of at least one major construction company that has either stopped drug testing or is quietly fudging results somehow because they literally could not find anyone who was clean.
Imagine a whole crew from the welder with flammable gas tanks to the guy driving a hugh-jass bulldozer being some degree of stoned. Nice state of affairs, isn’t it?
Absolutley disgusting. Just another day down on the DEmocrat Vote Slave Plantation.
That is just one item that the public is aware of. Try looking at Workmen’s Comp rates. So much fraud for so many long years that those rates have gone thru the roof.
For years in Calif, no employer’s WC insurance company would fight the claim in court with the price of attorneys. Now—a lifetime of payments for a claim that was granted that was fake. NOW-—too late, they are fighting claims. Damages donw.
Want to get a new roof on your house? The WC insurance premium for a roofing company I used to do bookkeeping for in the early 1990’s had a WC premium rate of 105% of the GRO
SS wages.
For every $100 gross paid to a worker, the WC insurance premium was $105. Now you know why your roof is so expensive.
Yes. I had a disastrous encounter with them when we were extremely hard up and not knowing where our next meal was coming from! Dreadfully managed chain.
Trickle down effect of voting for Legal Marijuana.....
Sow the seeds-—Reap the reward.....
What’s preventing you from starting YOUR OWN BUSINESS? Sounds like you are old enough to have experience.
I went self-employed in 1980 and haven’t looked back.
Businesses are looking for a 100% trained and experienced worker they can immediately plug into a position, at the lowest possible wage. Training programs are almost non-existent these days, and the notion of hiring intelligent young employees and developing them into trained workers is “antiquated thinking”.
Read all the posts, for God’s sake. He’s clearly a successful businessman. All he said was that in the past he had bad bosses. Anyone who hasn’t had a bad boss is either very lucky or isn’t very astute in judging other people.
Which explains what it’s like waiting on the checkout line in any retail store in America!
Right. Make America Great Again.
If you want to go toe to toe, I’m game.
You last sentence and actually everything you wrote is heartbreakingly true.
Be your own boss. Start today.
I've got three of them within a mile of where I live. And that doesn't count the one that went out of business and was replaced by another one that ALSO went out of business.
Again BS. If a supplier raised the price of a chip set they raise their price. Labor is like any other commodity.
Then why are prices for home electronics products always falling over time?
That is a great quote. I'm going to steal it, but I'll make sure I remember to credit you as the source. LOL!
It's one thing to take a junior CADD technician and train him to work in our IT department (we do this a lot), but you can't expect someone in our legal department to be "agile" enough to design bridges when the need arises next month.
I always see training as a two-way street. I am willing to commit my company's resources, but I want the employee to have a stake in it, too. For junior staff who aren't making a lot of money and can't be expected to pick up part of the cost, I'll usually ask them to pay their part of the "cost" by donating their time.
Yes, that was the thrust of that easy read “Who moved my cheese?”. A warning anyone should have been able to understand, and a way to prepare Americans for the high unemployment that was coming (and subsequently arrived).
There are plenty of people that aren’t recent graduates who have the necessary skills; companies don’t want to pay them because they are accustomed to better wages and benefits than the McJobs packages offered by more and more employers today.
That’s exactly right; wages have undoubtedly been driven down. About 25 years ago when I came out of school I was surprised by how many “entry-level” jobs required 2-3 years experience.
As for the glass ceiling for white guys, I’ve used that to my benefit over the last few years; I work “like a girl” (the bare minimum hours). I don’t make a lot of money, but I’ve never made so much per hour in my life (since the unpaid “salaried” overtime was dropped). Because the women “playing office” won’t work it, I don’t either - and it is easy enough to document so the company can’t do anything about it.
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