Lowry: I’m curious how many of those people who choose to leave a position due to burnout—the Great Resignation, Lie Flat or whichever—will still try to generate an income in a different way. That could mean turning to some version of the gig economy, so that they're still earning an income and can continue to invest and contribute to retirement accounts. Because, particularly in your 30s, it could put you in a precarious situation to completely tap out of the labor force and press pause on being able to contribute to investment accounts for your future self.
Bahat: What should employers be doing differently?
Lowry: Pay people better. It's interesting to me how often you look at these perks that employers try to provide which are basically here's how we keep you at the office for longer and longer periods of time and keep you happy about it. Raising wages, is what will keep people, at least for a period of time, more content.
Leondis: Employers, especially for white-collar jobs, talk about all the ways they're going to be more flexible with employees, but at the end of the day the most important thing is how much you're making. Especially for people with children who are trying to make a decision about whether both parents work or if one should stay home with the kids, that's how they make those decisions, by running the numbers. The other flexibility stuff sounds nice, but it really comes down to what you're earning.
Schrager: It's easy to say you should just pay your workers more, but most people are working for companies that have fairly thin profit margins, so it's not so easy to raise pay, unless they hire fewer people or start offering other perks. I think we're going to be seeing more people more dependent on the Walmarts for employment, because they can afford to raise rates when other companies can't in their industries. So maybe they get the higher quality employees.
Bahat: Is the prescription just, fire your bad managers?
Schrager: When the labor market wasn't as competitive, people didn't take culture and management seriously. Management was kind of an afterthought. You don't have to fire them, but maybe retrain them and make them realize that you have to make people feel valued.
Leondis: The labor shortage is forcing a reevaluation of who employers decide to make a manager. We've all been in jobs where someone thriving in a position is promoted, but it doesn't mean they'll be a particularly skillful manager. So it forces companies to think about whether they're promoting the right people into a role that fits for them. Management isn't for everyone.
Allison Schrager is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. She is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of An Economist Walks Into a Brothel: And Other Unexpected Places to Understand Risk.