American companies have indeed struggled, since the country has recovered from the pandemic, to find enough staff, and the number of resignations is at an all-time high.
Labor shortages are the main concern for businesses in the United States, while supply difficulties, although still severe, are less of a concern, according to a survey by the National Association for Business Economics (NABE) published on Monday. .
“The results and outlook are positive despite clearly visible shortages, in particular labor shortages,” said Jan Hogrefe, the director of this quarterly survey, carried out from January 3 to 12 among economists in companies or business sectors.
American companies have indeed struggled, since the country has recovered from the pandemic, to find enough staff, and the number of resignations is at an all-time high.
A worsening phenomenon
Thus, “57% of respondents report shortages of skilled labor in their companies”, while nearly a quarter (24%) report shortages of unskilled labor, said Jan Hogrefe.
The phenomenon has worsened since the last NABE survey, carried out in October, since only 47% of economists reported a lack of skilled labor and 11% for unskilled labor.
The lack of unskilled labor “reflects the largest increase among all the shortages studied”, underlines NABE in the press release, and only a third of the economists polled (33%, against 36% in October) think that the problem is will ease in 2022.
As a result, wages are climbing and “for the first time in the survey’s 40-year history, more than two-thirds (68%) of respondents say wages at their company have increased in the previous three months. the third consecutive survey, no respondent reported a drop in wages,” the statement said.
Wages go up
Only a quarter of respondents (26%) indicated that their company does not suffer from any shortage of manpower.
Concerns related to the supply chain are on the other hand less marked than they were in October: 12% of the economists questioned see this problem as the main risk for the activity of their company, against 20% in October.
The survey reports “uncertainty” about the expected duration of these difficulties, which makes predictions difficult. But of those surveyed who answered this question nonetheless, a quarter (26%) anticipate these shortages easing in the second half of 2022, when 11% see them persisting until 2023 or later.
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