Making sure their workplace is safe, paying people fairly and considering childcare needs could help employers find staff amid a labor shortage that is persisting longer than economists’ expectations.
Overall, the U.S. has roughly 11 million job openings and 7.7 million unemployed.
After months of speculation by economists that there would be a hiring increase in September, when COVID-19 pandemic-related extended unemployment ended, the most recent Bureau of Labor Statistics jobs report only showed a 0.4 percent employment increase, equal to 194,000 jobs overall.
As those jobs were added, 309,000 women over age 20 dropped out of the labor force and 182,000 men joined it.
Women could be leaving the labor force as schools starts due to a lack of childcare options, according to the Washington Post. Although many schools across the nation have tried to reopen for in-person learning after on-and-off remote learning spurts necessitated by the pandemic, the delta variant-fueled spike in cases over the summer is still making in-person school a challenge.
“It’s been so unpredictable. In-person school has not been reliable, and working moms had to balance that with trying to have a career,” explained Alicia Sasser Modestino, an economics professor at Northeastern University. “My 9-year-old woke up with sniffles and could not go to school today. I am living this in real time.”
For some parents returning to work could actually be more expensive than staying home.
“Child care is a big factor. It’s expensive. If I get a part-time teaching job, I would pay more for child care than I would be making,” said Bahar Cetinsoy a former teacher who is now caring for her son, who was born during the pandemic. “I have never been unemployed for this long.”
According to The Mom Project, a digital talent marketplace focused on working mothers, 88 percent of moms rank flexibility as an important quality for an employer. Most mothers said they would prefer a hybrid schedule of office and home work.
Some employers, including General Motors, Amazon, Apple and Facebook, have also started helping their employees with childcare needs. Bright Horizons Family Solutions, the employer-based childcare provider used by those companies, said its customer base increased by 20 percent last year, according to CNBC.
“People realize that, especially for essential workers, they needed child care in order to be able to come to work,” said Maribeth Bearfield, chief human resources officer at Bright Horizons.
Apart from childcare concerns, people are less willing to accept unsafe work conditions and low pay in the wake of a pandemic that showed just how vulnerable employees could be to COVID-19 infection and sudden job loss.
Low-wage workers in particular are fighting back against years of poor pay and stressful work environments, said The Washington Post.
An Amazon/Ipsos poll released this year found that most Americans support increasing the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $15. Federal minimum wages were last raised more than a decade ago.
An article by Dr. Amy K. Glasmeier, an MIT professor, and Allison Omen, Chief Strategy Officer at JUST Capital said that $15 isn’t even a suitable living wage for most people in the U.S., and Bank of America announced this week its new minimum wage is $21.
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If workers do think that an employer’s wages are enough to get them back to work, many still don’t want to be in an unhealthy or unsafe environment.
A study by All Voices, an employee feedback management platform, found that 52 percent of respondents had experienced unsafe working conditions, 56 percent had reported them and 41 percent had left a job because of them.
“For now, people are still hesitant to take the first jobs available to them, if they don’t believe they’re good jobs,” said The Washington Post.
This new outlook seems to be sticking around despite the end of pandemic unemployment benefits, contradicting a theory unemployment aid kept people from going back to work. Even as millions lost aid, employment didn’t go up to match it.
“Organizations need to not only take measures that will make everyone feel safe once back in the office, but recognize any undue pressure or expectations they’re forcing on their employees, and to listen to and be receptive to their fears and hesitations in returning to the workplace,” said All Voices. “Flexibility, resiliency, empathy, and understanding will be key characteristics for organizations who want to make a successful transition back to the office in 2021.”
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