Millions of people quit their jobs in the 'Great Resignation.' Here is why it may not last long Over the past several months, a rapidly growing number of Americans left their jobs – more than 4.4 million alone in September. The move has become known as the "Great Resignation," but the picture is more complicated. It all adds up to a jobs market in which people leaving their positions is driven more by temporary Covid concerns than a general strike. ----------------------- Like I said, Mom or Dad temporarily staying home with the kids.
The ‘Great Resignation’ slowed down in October, while job openings jumped Job quitters declined by 4.7%, falling to 4.16 million from 4.36 million, according to the Labor Department. Job openings accelerated to just below their all-time high, totaling 11.03 million, an increase of 4.1% as the rate rose to 6.9% from 6.7%. Economists have used the term “The Great Resignation” to describe the large number of quits in recent months.
How millions of jobless Americans can afford to ditch work Instead, early retirement — whether forced by the pandemic or made possible otherwise — is playing a big role in America's evolving labor market. People have left the workforce for myriad reasons in the past two years — layoffs, health insecurity, child care needs, and any number of personal issues that arose from the disruption caused by the pandemic. But among those who have left and are not able to — or don't want to — return,the vast majority are older Americans who accelerated their retirement. Earlier this month, ADP Chief Economist Nela Richardson said the strong stock market along with soaring home prices "has given some higher income people options. We already saw a large portion of the Boomer workforce retiring. And they're in a better position now."
Indeed. Either sped up retirement or they are younger and can live with mom and dad. And in medical. Here in Miami, it almost impossible to find a General practitioner. All we have are Nurse practitioner. Most primary physicians have gone into Pharma research or executive positions in medical corporations because of patient burn out. Most of the nurses down here were filipinas, and they all had to go back when the first wave struck. Joe doesn't want to open H1B visas in most industries for fear of disturbing potential Americans possibility looking or planning to start looking in those fields. In fact, foreign visa workers all had to leave (except probably silicon valley workers) during the first wave and still haven't come back. But realistically, most of the added and new jobs numbers over the last ten years were based in fast food, retail, quick casual and store front work (its not like we have a thriving manufacturing base in the USA). Those people were young and hated the jobs from day one. They are the ones probably living at home with mom and dad and wont come back till wages and conditions are much much better. If the post office ever started laying off we would see huge chaos to jobs numbers (imagine all those drivers and logistic workers actually delivering something useful). There are a real shortage of truckers, but I think that market dynamics are the reason for this. Amazon and Walmart try to keep truckers wages very low, so most existing independent truckers take loads from outside of retail and food. Shipping commercial air conditioner units or electrical substation parts pays double that of food or amazon goods. Notice, there is no shortage of UPS or Fedex drivers cuz these have always been high paying and good work conditions jobs. McDonald's and 7 Eleven pay their in-store workers extremely low wages but their Martin-Brower and Southland Corp drivers are paid handsomely indeed.
Actually Walmart is one of the most sought after employers for truckers. They pay their truckers very well (starting at $86,000/year) with excellent benefits and work conditions. You need to have a driving record with no dings for the past 5 years to even apply, and the interview process is supposed to be one of the toughest in the industry, but they still turn away far more drivers than they hire. Here's a good Quora post from some actual truckers, but if you do a google search you'll see that this is pretty universally considered to be the case (1) Since Walmart pays truck drivers $86,000 starting pay, why don’t all drivers work for Walmart? - Quora