Labor shortages are the biggest concern for businesses in the United States, while supply difficulties, while still severe, are less of a concern, according to a survey by the National Association for Business Economics (NABE) released Monday.
"
The results and outlook are positive despite clearly visible shortages, in particular labor shortages
," said Jan Hogrefe, the director of this quarterly survey, carried out from January 3 to 12 among business economists. or industries.
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American companies have indeed struggled, since the country has recovered from the pandemic, to find enough staff, and the number of resignations is at an all-time high.
Thus, "
57% of respondents report shortages of skilled labor in their companies
", while almost a quarter (24%) report shortages of unskilled labor, specified Jan Hogrefe.
The phenomenon has worsened since the last NABE survey, carried out in October, since only 47% of economists reported a lack of skilled labor and 11% for unskilled labor.
The lack of unskilled labor "
reflects the largest increase among all the shortages studied
", underlines NABE in the press release, and only a third of the economists polled (33%, against 36% in October) think that the problem will subside in 2022.
wages go up
As a result, wages are climbing and “
for the first time in the survey's 40-year history, more than two-thirds (68%) of respondents say wages at their company have increased in the previous three months.
For the third consecutive survey, no respondent reported a drop in wages
, ”explains the press release.
Only a quarter of respondents (26%) indicated that their company does not suffer from any lack of manpower.
Concerns related to the supply chain are on the other hand less marked than they were in October: 12% of the economists questioned see this problem as the main risk for the activity of their company, against 20% in October.
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The survey reports "
uncertainty
" about the expected duration of these difficulties, which makes predictions difficult.
But of those surveyed who answered this question nonetheless, a quarter (26%) anticipate these shortages easing in the second half of 2022, when 11% see them persisting until 2023 or later.