The pandemic has caused fundamental shifts in worker behaviour

Jeff Beck has died! A masterful musician. Very sad. We move on. I read an interesting research paper recently – “The Great Retirement Boom”: The Pandemic-Era Surge in Retirements and Implications for Future Labor Force Participation – published in the US Federal Reserve Bank’s Finance and Economics Discussion Series (released November 2022), which illustrates how the pandemic is altering the behaviour of the US labour market. The lessons from the US are relevant everywhere as governments progressively ignore the reality that a dangerous virus is still in our midst and still causing havoc (deaths, long-term disability and more). For those who are continuing to claim the pandemic is some sort of conspiracy to control us or that Covid is less dangerous than influenza or that mask wearing is redundant and all the rest of the nonsense that seems to perpetrated by some on the Left who think they are for ‘freedom’ and those on the Right who just care about profits, this sort of research should presents a serious wake up call.

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US labour market continues to grow as more working age people find jobs

Well, happy 2023 to all my readers. We are back for another year – the 19th in this blog’s existence. All the observers have been waiting for a sign that the US interest rate hikes are slowing the US economy down, which is the mainstream logic that has been used to justify the regressive policy shift. The data, so far, suggests that the inflationary pressures are subsiding as a consequence of the factors other than the interest rate changes which seem to have done little other than redistribute income to the rich away from the poor. The latest labour market data release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics supports that view. Last Friday (January 6, 2022), the US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released their latest labour market data – Employment Situation Summary – December 2022 – which revealed on-going employment growth, rising participation and falling unemployment. These are good signs for American workers. Further, as inflation is subsiding the modest nominal wages growth is now providing real wages growth – another virtuous sign. The latest data is certainly not consistent with the Federal Reserve type narratives. But who should be surprised by that.

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My blog is on holidays until Monday, January 9, 2023

My blog is on holiday until Monday, January 7, 2023. I have lots of things to finish writing to meet deadlines and a lot of personal things to do (moving things, etc) which require travel and time. So I am using this week for that. Happy 2023 to all. I can’t say it is an optimistic outlook but hope springs eternal. To the obsessives declaring Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) is dead I urge sedatives. To those declaring Covid to be a conspiracy of big pharma, I hope you don’t catch it. To others, all the best.

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