Americans Demand Higher Wages
People need to make ends meet.
In a recent interview, Chief Workforce Analyst Employ Bridge Joanie Bily broke down the recent January jobs report.
Bily also admitted that thanks to President Biden’s soaring inflation, workers are being forced to demand for more pay along with a number of other things such as flexibility like working remotely.
In transcript provided by Fox, Bily explained, “The employee is in the driver’s seat, and they want different things coming out of this pandemic – or hopefully coming out of this pandemic, I should say. But they want more flexibility, they want to work remotely, they want a hybrid model, but they want more pay. That is certainly one of the top things we are seeing and inflation is driving that. I also think the labor participation rate moving in the right direction is a great sign to see more people participating. But it’s also inflation that is driving that.”
She then added, “People are going to the grocery store or the gas pump, and they don’t have their dollar, obviously isn’t going as far. And so maybe a family that had one person working is saying ‘Hey, now we both need to get back to work,’ look at what things are costing just to put food on the table. So we are seeing more people come back to work, but we do have that spiral that Stephanie, or Liz was talking about where we’re seeing that combination of wages increasing, inflation increasing. Hopefully, we’ll get more people back to work. The jobs are out there, but it is a very, very challenging employment market. And we’re going to see that in earnings season when companies report their profits, they’re going to feel those increased costs of payroll.”
