2021年8月19日 星期四

職位空缺創歷史新高。為什麼人們不回去工作?

 https://www.barrons.com/articles/job-openings-are-at-a-record-high-why-arent-people-going-back-to-work-51629232945

根據美國勞工統計局的數據,截至 6 月底,美國勞動力市場有1010 萬個職位空缺。7月份仍有870萬工人失業。如果職位空缺比求職者多這麼多,為什麼還有失業工人?

過去 17 個月的每一個逆經濟趨勢和難題——包括為什麼這麼多工作崗位空缺——都有相同的解釋:大流行。在這種情況下,它正在創造經濟學家所說的“搜索摩擦”。而且,就像病毒一樣,這是一種我們以前從未經歷過且不完全了解的新變種。

所有市場都有摩擦。摩擦是任何阻止買方和賣方立即進行交易的東西。如果購物者必須去多家商店尋找商品,或在購買前比較商店,或者住在出售產品的商店附近——所有這些都是摩擦的例子。在勞動力市場上,購物者是雇主,賣家是工人,摩擦會導致招聘速度減慢和失業率上升。

勞動力市場有很多摩擦,但不一定都是負面的。一個健康的儲蓄賬戶使工人能夠花時間找到合適的工作,而不是第一份可用的工作,這是一種摩擦。需要住在年邁的父母附近,這給找工作設置了地理界限,這是一種摩擦。

25 個州的州長提前幾個月終止了 300 美元的聯邦失業支票時,他們沒有使用這個詞,但他們也在解決一個已知的摩擦:失業工人的公共財政支持來源。

大流行仍在引入新的摩擦。同樣於 6 月收集的求職者調查中,Indeed Hiring Lab 發現,不急於或不急於尋找工作的主要原因是 Covid-19 問題和兒童保育需求。

這是怎麼玩的?如果疫苗接種率低、病例激增、顧客不需要戴口罩或三者兼而有之,則擔心感染 Covid-19 的個人可能會更不願意接受工作擔心病毒的人也可能很難找到工作條件較好的工作,例如接種疫苗的同事比例或與他人保持距離工作的能力。

失業者不僅需要找到符合他們技能的工作,而且還需要找到一個擁有與他們自己的疫苗和口罩信仰相一致的雇主。這是我們以前從未見過的勞動力市場摩擦,鑑於工人的自我報告,它可能很大。

同樣,如果孩子沒有照顧,父母就無法工作。儘管學校正在重新開放,但 12 歲以下的孩子沒有接種疫苗,他們仍然容易感染病毒。家長們知道 Covid-19 可能會導致學校突然停課如果一個學生檢測結果呈陽性,她的全班學生可能不得不在家待五天甚至十天。在這種情況下,失業的父母需要找到一份與他們的托兒計劃相匹配的工作,並且可以適應潛在的隨機和重複關閉。托兒需求長期以來一直是一個摩擦,但這次大流行大大放大了它的影響。

可以肯定的是,特定於經濟衰退的勞動力市場摩擦並不總是像最初出現的那麼嚴重。例如,在大蕭條期間,最大的擔憂是“房鎖”——人們的抵押貸款陷入困境,以至於他們無法搬家接受新工作。房屋鎖定被認為是複蘇緩慢的潛在解釋,但大多數研究發現,雖然這對某些工人來說是一個重大限制,但它對勞動力市場整體的影響可以忽略不計希望 Covid-19 的摩擦也能證明這種情況。

現在我們的勞動力市場正在反彈。670萬員工在六月。20 多年來只有兩次在一個月內僱傭了這麼多人,那是去年 5 月和 6 月解除封鎖。鑑於在大流行期間數百萬人退出了勞動力市場,失業人數不斷增加是件好事。這意味著更多的人又開始找工作了。

儘管如此,這些 Covid-19 摩擦仍然是逆風,即使強勁的勞動力市場可以掩蓋它們的影響。

最近幾個月,有報導稱零售小時工工資新員工的津貼有所增加包括學費或招聘獎金;當它是賣方市場時,就像現在的工人一樣,他們有更多的權力要求或期望更高的報酬。但接下來的幾個月可能會出現更多關於雇主疫苗接種要求需要疫苗接種證明的職位發布的報告更高的工資並不能緩解 Covid-19 的擔憂,而且在大流行得到控制之前,這種摩擦不會消退。

像這樣的客座評論是由 Barron's 和 MarketWatch 新聞編輯室以外的作者撰寫的。它們反映了作者的觀點和意見。ideas@barrons.com提交評論建議和其他反饋 



 

Job Openings are at a Record High. Why Aren’t People Going Back to Work?


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Businesses are struggling to fill positions, despite offering new perks and higher wages.

Patrick T. Fallon/AFP via Getty Images

About the author: Kathryn A. Edwards is a labor economist at the nonprofit, nonpartisan RAND Corporation.

The U.S. labor market had 10.1 million job openings at the end of June, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. But 8.7 million workers were still unemployed in July. If there are so many more openings than jobseekers, why are there unemployed workers left?

Every bucked economic trend and difficult question of the last 17 months — including why so many jobs are unfilled — has the same explanation: the pandemic. In this case, it is creating what economists call a “search friction.” And, like the virus, this is a new variant we’ve never experienced before and don’t fully understand.

All markets have friction. A friction is anything that prevents a buyer and seller from transacting instantaneously. If a shopper has to go to multiple stores to find an item, or comparison shops before purchasing, or doesn’t live close to a store carrying the product — all of these are examples of frictions. In the labor market, where the shoppers are employers and the sellers are workers, a friction creates slower hiring and higher unemployment.

The labor market has lots of frictions, but they aren’t all necessarily negative. A healthy savings account that enables a worker to take time to find the right job, rather than the first job available, is a friction. The need to live near aging parents, which puts a geographic boundary on a job search, is a friction.

When governors in 25 states ended the $300 federal add-on to unemployment checks months early, they didn’t use the term, but they too were addressing a known friction: public sources of financial support to unemployed workers.

The pandemic is still introducing new frictions. In its Job Seeker Survey, also collected in June, the Indeed Hiring Lab found that the top reasons for not searching too hard or urgently for a job are Covid-19 concerns and child care demands.

How does this play out? An individual worried about contracting Covid-19 might be more hesitant to take a job if vaccination rates are low, cases are spiking, customers are not required to wear masks, or a combination of all three. An individual worried about the virus might also have a difficult time finding a job with preferred working conditions, such as the share of coworkers who are vaccinated or the ability to work at a distance from others.

Not only does an unemployed person need to find a job that matches their skills, but they need to find an employer that has vaccine and mask beliefs that align to their own. This is a labor market friction we’ve not seen before, and given the self-reports of workers, it is potentially large.

Likewise, a parent cannot work if their kid does not have care. Although schools are reopening, kids under 12 aren’t vaccinated and are still vulnerable to the virus. Parents know that Covid-19 could produce sudden short-term school closures; if a student tests positive, her whole class may have to stay home for five or even ten days. In this situation, an unemployed parent needs to find a job that matches their child- care schedule and can accommodate potentially random and repeated closures. The demands of child care have long been a friction, but the pandemic greatly magnified its effect.

Recession-specific labor market frictions aren’t always as significant as they first appear, to be sure. During the Great Recession, for example, the big concern was “house lock” — people underwater on their mortgage so that they couldn’t move to accept a new job. House lock was floated as a potential explanation for the slow recovery, but most research has found that, although it was a significant constraint for certain workers, its effects on the labor market overall were negligible. Hopefully that will prove to be the case with the Covid-19 frictions too.

Right now we have a labor market that is rebounding. There were 6.7 million hires in June. Only twice in more than 20 years have that many people been hired in a single month, and that was May and June of last year coming out of lockdown. Given that millions of people dropped out of the labor force during the pandemic, rising numbers of unemployed workers is good. It means more of them have started looking for jobs again.

These Covid-19 frictions are headwinds, nonetheless, even if a strong labor market can mask their effect.

Recent months have seen reports of wage increases for hourly retail workers and perks for new hires including tuition or hiring bonuses; when it’s a seller’s market, like it is now for workers, they have more power to demand or expect higher remuneration. But the next few months will likely feature instead more reports of employer vaccination requirements and job postings that require proof of vaccination; higher wages can’t assuage Covid-19 concerns, and that friction won’t subside before the pandemic is contained.

Guest commentaries like this one are written by authors outside the Barron’s and MarketWatch newsroom. They reflect the perspective and opinions of the authors. Submit commentary proposals and other feedback to ideas@barrons.com.

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