We touched on employment conditions yesterday (here and here), and, again, I’m in the camp that believes the latest is not about a slowing economy at this point, it’s about the obvious:
From the National Federation of Independent Businesses this week:
“Small employers are struggling to fill open positions and find qualified workers resulting in record high levels of owners raising compensation,” said NFIB Chief Economist Bill Dunkelberg. “Owners are raising compensation in an attempt to attract workers and these costs are being passed on to consumers through price hikes for goods and services, creating inflation pressures.”
The “raising compensation” is a sticky factor when we’re talking future inflation…
“Forty-four freight ships are stuck awaiting entry into California’s two largest ports, the highest number recorded since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Marine Exchange of Southern California reported on Saturday.
The queue is a result of the labor shortage, COVID-19-related disruptions, and holiday-buying surges. Port of Los Angeles data indicated that the ships’ average wait time had increased to 7.6 days.”
While the inflation resulting from such bottlenecks may not “stick” like that resulting from rising wages, it raises the bar on prices nevertheless. I.e., will, in the aftermath, prices descend to pre-bottleneck levels?