If you have not observed a “Help Wanted” or “We are Hiring” sign this week, then you must be sitting in a cave.
From CPA firms to sandwich shops, area employers are desperate for staff. And many have cut operating hours and services because of employee shortages.
It’s not only a Shreveport-Bossier problem. Nationwide businesses are struggling to fill jobs.
Commentators, locally and nationally, have identified many factors that have contributed to this challenge.
Here are some of the assumptions:
1. Too much federal/state dollars in the form of stimulus payments, unemployment payments and/or tax returns in bank accounts.
2. Continued resistance to entering the business world due to Covid-19 concerns.
3. Lack of quality affordable child care options which require a stay-at-home parent.
4. Increased concerns with aging parents living in nursing homes necessitating stay-at-home adult children.
5. Reduced income needs of people who scaled back expenditures during the strict pandemic limitations.
6. New income sources from home businesses started during the pandemic.
7. Pent-up demand for summer vacations, travel and other non-job activities.
8. Changing job demands, often necessitated by the pandemic, that eliminated some unskilled worker positions.
9. Retirement of senior citizens who took a Covid break and have decided not to return to the work environment.
10. Reduced birth rates that have lowered the pool of first-time employees.
There can be other reasons that are contributing to the dearth of serious job applicants.
Whatever the reason(s), the ability of businesses to fully reopen and expand are being seriously hampered.
THIS ARTICLE WAS PUBLISHED IN THE May 28 ISSUE OF FOCUS SB - THE INQUISITOR.