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 to be the easy fix that some employers and many elected offi- cials — people who have been pinning the ‘workforce crisis,’ as it’s called, on an over-generous federal government — thought it would be.
Rick Sullivan, president and CEO of the Western Massachu- setts Economic Development Council (EDC), told BusinessWest that data and anecdotal evidence from states that did away with the federal bonus checks months ago indicate this has not been the cure most thought it would be.
“States that ceased the incentive on their unemployment ear- lier have not seen huge upticks in labor participation,” he noted. “But we’ll see what happens; we certainly think some people will enter the workforce when the benefit goes away.”
He was quick to note, however, that he has heard from some of his members that, through smaller, more-targeted job fairs and other recruiting efforts, they are seeing an uptick in the numbers of applications and hirings. Still, he said far more evi- dence is needed to get a real grasp of what’s happening with the labor market, let alone project what will happen over the next few quarters and beyond.
Kevin Lynn, president and CEO of MassHire Springfield Career Center, agreed. “Murky” was the word he used repeatedly
“This whole thing is not new. We’ve been
hanging this lack of applicants on COVID and the unemployment situation. But if you go back to, let’s say July through December of 2019, all you heard from companies was that they had no applicants, and when they did have an applicant, they were being ghosted — ghosting became the new term.”
to describe the future of the jobs market in this region.
“It’s an incredibly murky time, because it’s all unprecedented,”
he explained. “And there are so any variables. This is not a reces- sion, it’s a healthcare crisis, and it’s been like a rollercoaster; we seem to be on a rollercoaster going down again, and that does not play well psychologically.”
Lynn went further and said that, while the problems and frus- trations currently being experienced by area employers may be heightened by the pandemic and factors related to it — childcare shortages, fear of returning to the office, mass retirements, and an unwillingness to work for low wages (he and others would get into all those) — in many ways, it’s all simply a continuation of what was happening before the pandemic.
“This whole thing is not new,” he said. “We’ve been hanging this lack of applicants on COVID and the unemployment situ- ation. But if you go back to, let’s say July through December of 2019, all you heard from companies was that they had no appli- cants, and when they did have an applicant, they were being ghosted — ghosting became the new term.
“Companies were having major recruiting problems prior to COVID,” he went on. “What we’re seeing is nothing new.”
For this issue, BusinessWest talked with several area economic- development leaders about the workforce crisis and the murki- ness that surrounds just what will come next.
Food for Thought
Lynn told BusinessWest he was in Boston over Labor Day weekend. During his time there, he had an experience at a res- taurant that was eye-opening if not frightening — a hard look at how things are for employers, especially in hospitality, and how they might — that’s might — continue to be.
“There were 15 tables there, and one woman was waiting on all 15 tables — I couldn’t believe it,” he said, using exasperation
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