(What’s Left of) Our Economy: The Best Way(s) to Handle Labor Shortages

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apprenticeships, Immigration, labor shortages, productivity, The Wall Street Journal, training, wages, Will Feuer, {What's Left of) Our Economy

Could a learning curve be developing in American business about U.S. labor market issues? One hopeful sign appeared today in a Wall Street Journal report on current shortages of workers needed to build new federally funded fast internet systems for under-served rural American communities.

Specifically, the article by Will Feuer wasn’t dominated by thinly disguised pleas for more immigration to fill the gap. In fact, no one he interviewed – even the heads of the companies trying to put these networks in place – called for opening U.S. borders wider to boost the national pool of “fiber splicers.”

Instead – and somewhat contrary to the piece’s somewhat alarmist headline – many of the firms engaged in this endeavor are responding the way that businesses have dealt with scarce labor throughout American history – by becoming more productive. And others are trying to expand supply of possible hires domestically in various ways.

Some are making products that are simpler to work with, and therefore require fewer workers to complete a given assignment. Others are changing their business models – e.g., moving more of their installation, maintenance, and repair work on fixed broadband networks in-house, or retraining employees involved in lower-demand projects to handle the surge of new orders that will stream in as tens of billions of government dollars start getting spent to build the new systems.

Still others are conducting training programs for their own workers and sponsoring apprenticeships for potential workers – including high school students – already residing in the United States. Others are raising pay – another way to attract and retain more employees, and a screamingly obvious one, too. (In fact, one shortcoming of the report is the lack of any information on current wages in the industry and how they’ve changed over time.) And surely some are trying some or all of the above.

The broader implications, moreover, should be crystal clear.  The nation can either follow a labor force policy of balancing supply and demand in ways historically proven to raise living standards sustainably, and ensure that greater technolotical and managerial efficiencies maximize benefits for both busines and the existing domestic workforce.  Or it can pursue immigration-centric approaches whenever companies or industries claim labor shortages, and achieve race-to-the-bottom-type results.

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Making News: National Radio Podcast Now On-Line on Fingering the World’s Real Protectionists…& More!

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CBS Eye on the World with John Batchelor, China, economics, Following Up, global economy, Global Imbalances, globalization, Gordon G. Chang, Immigration, Jeremy Beck, labor shortages, NumbersUSA, protectionism, Trade

I’m pleased to announce that the podcast of my interview last night on John Batchelor’s nationally syndicated radio show is now on-line.

Click here for a timely discussion – with co-host Gordon G. Chang – on the crucial issue of whether recent U.S. moves bythe Trump and Biden administrations represent a worrisome new lurch toward destructive trade protectionism, or efforts to defend and promote legitimate American – and sometimes global – interests.

In addition, on January 10, in his blog for the immigration realist organization NumbersUSA, Jeremy Beck quoted from my December 29 post debunking the numerous recent claims blaming the labor shortages that have popped up in many U.S. industries on policies that have enabled too few foreigners to join the American labor force. 

And keep checking in with RealityChek for news of upcoming media appearances and other developments.

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: No, Immigration Curbs Haven’t Caused U.S. Labor Shortages

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CCP Virus, Center for Immigation Studies, coronavirus, COVID 19, immigrants, Immigration, Karen Ziegler, Labor Force Participation Rate, labor shortages, LFPR, prime-age population, productivity, Steven A. Camarota, Trump administration, wages, workers, {What's Left of) Our Economy

Thanks to the non-partisan Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), one of the biggest and most harmful recent claims about the American economy has been exposed as a sham: that the current shortages of labor about which employers keep whining are due to a shortage of immigrant workers spurred by the Trump administration’s restrictive policies and worsened by the CCP Virus pandemic.

As known by RealityChek regulars, the very idea of a chronic labor shortage – as opposed to the kinds of temporary supply and demand mismatches that occur regularly in every market-based economy – is un-serious mainly because the solution typically is so simple: raise wages enough to attract new employees. And standard labor shortage claims tend to be harmful because they’re usually covers for business demands for more mass immigration – which enables them to keep wages down rather than respond by investing in labor-saving equipment and improving efficiency in ways that boost productivity and therefore benefit the entire economy, especially long term.

But leaving such broader considerations aside, CIS, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, has demonstrated that blaming immigration restrictions for all the Help Wanted signs that do indeed seem to be appearing all over the country is simply wrong on its face. According to a December 22 CIS study by Steven A. Camarota and Karen Ziegler, the biggest culprit by far is a continuing decline in the number of U.S.-born residents of the country looking for work.

The authors use Census data to show that although the number of immigrants (legal and illegal) working in America did fall from 27.8 million in November, 2018 (the Trump-era peak) and 27.7 million the following November (just before the pandemic arrived in the United States), by last month (the latest available) data, it was back up to 29.6 million. So there the immigrant worker population has not only recovered all of its pre-pandemic losses. It’s 1.9 million greater than its pre-CCP Virus level.

More important statisically speaking, that November, 2022 immigrant worker number is above the level it would have reached had this population’s growth trend going back to 2000 simply continued uninterrupted.

Meanwhile, the number of U.S.-born U.S. residents in the workforce has continued its long-term decline despite a modest rebound from pre-pandemic lows. The standard measure is the Labor Force Participation Rate (LFPR), which shows the share of working-age Americans are either on the job or looking for one.

The LFPR for all U.S.-born residents of the country fell from 77.3 percent in November, 2000 to 74.1 percent in 2019, dropped further in pandemic-y 2020, and has only bounced back modestly as of November, 2022 to 73.5 percent. And the post-2019 fall-offs for the most closely followed groups – “prime age” men and women, defined as the 25-54- year olds – have generally been steeper. As a result, the number of U.S.-born Americans at work now is 2.1 million smaller than in November, 2019.

In fact, Camarota and Ziegler calculate that if the total U.S. LFPR today was the same as in 2000, 6.5 million more U.S.-born residents would be either working or looking for work today. That’s 3.42 times more than the number of foreign-born residents who have been added to the working population during the pandemic era.

So whatever labor shortages have been experienced lately have been home-grown – and unrelated to immigration restrictions. And if the business community and others favoring more immigration were really interested in easing them meaningfully, they’d be spending more of their time figuring out how to attract more U.S.-born residents to the workplace. That wouldn’t boost national productivity or wages. But the social benefits of ending idleness and welfare dependency in the working-age population should hardly be ignored.

Unfortunately, as Camarota and Ziegler write, the push to fill the gap with immigrants both threatens to keep the native-born on the occupational sidelines and increase their vulnerability to crime, addiction, mental health issues, and obesity, as well as to “reduce political pressure from employers and society in general to address” the domestic LFPR decline.

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: How Labor Shortages Can Help U.S. Manfacturing – & the Entire Economy

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aerospace, aircraft parts, labor shortages, manufacturing, productivity, Reuters, {What's Left of) Our Economy

Here’s some advice for Reuters reporters Allison Lampert and Rajesh Kumar Singh, and their editors Kevin Krolicki and Bill Berkrot: If you’re going to produce a story showing that labor shortages are decimating output in a certain part of the economy, make sure they really are decimating output in a certain part of the economy. Because in the case of the U.S. aircraft parts sector on which their piece this morning focuses, it ain’t.

How do we know this? First of all, it’s true that “In the United States, aerospace employment” is below its “pre-pandemic level” (though by my calculations, the Labor Department data show the fall-off has been 7.66 percent from immediately pre-pandemic-y February, 2020 through last July) and not 8.4 percent, as the article contends). And that’s indeed much worse than the record compiled in manufacturing overall – which is up 0.52 percent during that period.

Further, the workforces in aircraft engines and engine parts are down even more sharply – by 8.94 percent and 14.88 percent, respectively.

But output “grounded,” as the headline claims? Not exactly. In fact, according to the Federal Reserve’s manufacturing production figures, output in the broad aerospace products and parts category has surged by 28.44 percent between February, 2020 and last month. In the narrower aircraft and parts grouping, the growth has been 30.60 percent.

And these numbers are inflation adjusted, meaning that they’re not being artificially boosted by price increases. They represent the volume of stuff being turned out. And they leave in the dust the results for manufacturing overall (up 3.69 percent in real terms since just before the CCP Virus arrived in force).

Even more striking, the output rebound in aerospace has remained strong recently. In that broad category, it’s jumped 10.38 percent year-on-year in August. For aircraft and parts, the surge has been an even faster 30.60 percent.

How can this be? The answer should be obvious to anyone who knows even a smidgeon of economics. These industries have become much more efficient. And indeed, official figures show that labor productivity in aerospace products and parts soared by 15.50 percent between 2020 and 2021 (the latest figures available). The comparable figure for all manufacturing? Just 3.30 percent. (As known by RealityChek regulars, the government also tracks a broader measure of productivity, called total factor productivity, but the detailed industry figures aren’t out yet.)

And here’s what’s totally weird: Steps taken by companies in aircraft parts to compensate for scarce workers, and plans to take more, were reported in the Reuters piece.

There’s no doubt that businesses in manufacturing overall and in aerospace in particular would love to have more workers – largely because demand for their products is exceptionally strong. But as the output and productivity data reveal, they’re figuring out how to solve this problem – and impressively.

That’s not only not a bad news story – it’s a great news story. And if other industries (including in the service sector) could remotely duplicate this performance, responding to labor shortages by making technological and other forms of progress, rather than by pleading for more mass immigration and other productivity-killing crutches, the entire economy and its prospects would be in much better shape than at present.

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: Everything You Wanted to Know About Immigration & the Economy — & Less

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economics, immigrants, Immigration, innovation, labor shortages, Open Borders, productivity, The Washington Post, wages, {What's Left of) Our Economy

Leave it to the zealously pro-Open Borders Washington Post. It chose as the reviewer of a book by two economic historians apparently unaware of the relationship in U.S. history between immigration levels and productivity improvement a business professor seemingly just slightly less clueless about this crucial link either historically and going forward.

Doubt that? Then take a look at this morning’s rave by Harvard business professor Michael Luca about a new study by Ran Abramitzky and Leah Boustan of Stanford and Princeton Universities, respectively, titled Streets of Gold: America’s Untold Story of Immigrant Success.

According to Luca, Streets of Gold “reflects an ongoing renaissance in the field of economic history fueled by technological advances — an increase in digitized records, new techniques to analyze them and the launch of platforms such as Ancestry — that are breathing new life into a range of long-standing questions about immigration. Abramitzky and Boustan are masters of this craft, and they creatively leverage the evolving data landscape to deepen our understanding of the past and present.”

And their overall conclusion (which rightly takes into account the non-economic contributions of immigrants to American life) is that (in Abamitzky’s and Boustan’s words): “Immigration contributes to a flourishing American society” – especially if you take “the long view.”

But there’s no indication in Luca’s review that the authors weigh in on a key (especially in the long view) impact of immigration on the U.S. economy – how it’s affected the progress made by the nation in boosting productivity: its best guarantee for raising living standards on a sustainable basis.

As I’ve written repeatedly, mainstream economic theory holds that one major spur to satisfactory productivity growth is the natural tendency of businesses to replace workers with various types of machinery and new technologies when those workers become too expensive. Most economists would add that although jobs may be lost on net in the short-term, they increase further down the road once these productivity advances create new companies, entire industries, and therefore employment opportunities.

By contrast, when businesses know that wages will stay low – for example, because large immigration inflows will keep pumping up the national labor supply much faster than the demand for workers rises – these companies will feel little need to buy new machinery or otherwise incorporate new technologies simply because they won’t have to.

And more important than what the theory says, abundant evidence indicates that businesses have behaved precisely this way in the past (when scarce and thus increasingly expensive labor prompted acquisitions of labor-saving devices that helped turn the United States into an economic and technology powerhouse), into the present (as industries heavily dependent on penny-wage and often illegal immigrant labor have tended to be major productivity laggards).  

Reviewer Luca demonstrates some awareness that this issue matters in the here and now and going forward, writing that “Compared with the rest of the country, businesses in high-immigration areas have access to more workers and hence less incentive to invest in further automation.”

He also points out that “This has implications for today’s immigration debates.”

But his treatment of the current situation is confused at best and perverse at worst (at least if you buy the economic conventional wisdom and evidence concerning the productivity-immigration relationship).

Principally, he claims that “the United States is expected to face a dramatic labor market shortage as baby boomers retire and lower birthrates over time result in fewer young people to replace them.” Let’s assume that’s true – despite all the evidence that more and more employers are filling all the job openings they’ve been claiming by automating. (See, e.g., here, here, and here.)

Why, though , does Luca simply conclude that “Increased immigration is one approach to avoiding the crunch. Notably, the other way to avert this crisis is through further automation, enabled by rapid advances in artificial intelligence. Immigration policy will help shape the extent to which the economy relies on people vs. machines in the decades to come.”

Is he really implying that a low-productivity — and therefore low-innovation — future would be a perfectly fine one for immigration (and other) policymakers to be seeking?

Just as important, although Luca clearly recognizes that these questions have at least some importance nowadays, he provides no indication of where the book’s authors stand.

So let the reader beware. Luca clearly believes, as Post headline writers claim, that Streets of Gold makes clear “What the research really says about American immigration.”  What his review makes clear is that this claim isn’t even close.

   

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: Will the Tech Competitiveness Bill Shaft American Tech Workers?

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China, competitiveness, Congress, Immigration, labor shortages, Lisa Irving, NumbersUSA, semiconductors, STEM, STEM workers, tariffs, tech workers, technology, Trade, visas, {What's Left of) Our Economy

In case you didn’t already think that the U.S. government has become a dysfunctional mess, the immigration realist group NumbersUSA has just highlighted a recent, thoroughly depressing example. It’s the decision of the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives to turn its version of a bill to boost American technological competitiveness (especially versus China) into a device to advance its Open Borders-friendly immigration agenda ever further – and at the expense in particular of native-born tech workers and tech worker hopefuls.

Not that the story of this competitiveness effort wasn’t a prime example of dysfunction already. As I’ve previously pointed out, both the House bill and its Senate counterpart were originally introduced in mid-2020, and these efforts still haven’t become law – even though concerns about China catching up to the United States technologically, and threatening both American national security and prosperity even more sharply, remain as strong and widespread as ever.

And not that the Democrats are solely responsible: As I’ve also noted, Senate Republicans have strongly supported provisions in their version of the legislation that would both greatly weaken a president’s authority to impose tariffs (including on China to offset the economic damage to U.S. industry from its predatory trade and broader economic practices), and reduce various existing tradei barriers to many imports (including from China).

But the immigration provisions of the House version could be just as damaging, and deserve at least as much attention. As explained by NumbersUSA analyst Lisa Irving, this legislation “allows for an unlimited number of green cards for citizens of foreign countries seeking permanent U.S. residency who hold a U.S. doctorate degree, or its equivalent from a foreign institution, in STEM [Science, Technology, Engineering,and Math fields].”

Adds Irving, “This provision would result in further limiting the job prospects and resources for highly qualified Americans in tech fields.” 

To add insult to injury, as Irving reminds, the measure is based on phony and thoroughly debunked claims, mainly propagated by the U.S. technology industry, that it’s facing a crippling labor and talent shortage. In fact, the tech sector’s prime objective is curbing wage and other compensation gains by opening the flood gates ever wider to foreign-born technologists willing to accept much lower pay.   

The best outcome for the cause of American competitiveness — and for its potential to benefit the existing American population economically — would be for the Congressional conference committee assigned with devising a final compromise version that President Biden can sign into law to strip the Senate version of its trade sections, and the House version of these immigration sections

But don’t expect any progress any time soon. Reuters reports that the committee will hold its first meeting next week – and will contain more than 100 House and Senate lawmakers. In other words, more than 100 cooks for this broth.

As a result, even though China continues massively subsidizing its own tech sector, and even though other countries have already responded with their own incentives aimed at attracting and maintaining their capabilities in semiconductors and other industries, “Congressional aides said it could still take months before a final agreement is reached.” In the ultimate sad commentary on American political dysfunction, given the glaring flaws of both bills, that could be a good thing. 

Following Up: Podcast Now On-Line of National Radio Interview on Biden Hints of China Tariff Cuts

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Biden administration, CBS Eye on the World with John Batchelor, China, Federation for American Immigration Reform, Following Up, Gordon G. Chang, Immigration, inflation, John Batchelor, labor shortages, tariffs

I’m pleased to announce that the podcast is now on-line of my interview last night on the nationally syndicated “CBS Eye on the World with John Batchelor.” Click here for a great conversation with John and co-host Gordon G. Chang on why the Biden administration’s interest in cutting tariffs on imports from China makes no sense on any score – including inflation-fighting.

In addition, it was great (even I was mis-ID’d) to see my April 7 post on the pro-Open Borders/Cheap Labor Lobby’s phony claims of a national labor shortage quoted Monday in a blog entry put up by the Federation for American Immigration Reform.

And keep checking in with RealityChek for news of upcoming media appearances and other developments.

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: Could the “Great Resignation” be Ending?

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CCP Virus, coronavirus, COVID 19, Employment, Great Resignation, Jobs, JOLTS, labor market, labor shortages, quits, quits rate, transitory, workers, Wuhan virus, {What's Left of) Our Economy

The Labor Department’s monthly “JOLTS” report is one of the official U.S. economic data series that I stopped covering during the CCP Virus era. After all, the results seemed to be so overwhelmingly driven by pandemic-specific disruptions, and therefore so unrelated to the fundamental state of the U.S. economy.

I’m still wary of putting too much stock in JOLTS, which stands for Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey. As the name suggests, it tracks how many positions at American businesses (including in government) are vacant, how many workers are quitting, how many are getting fired or laid off, and how many are getting hired, and it’s one of the key sets of statistics that have revealed both the extent of the labor shortages marking the economy and of what’s been called the “Great Resignation” – a major and indeed record increase in the numbers and percentages of workers voluntarily leaving their employers.

Yet since this development has so clearly (at least to me) stemmed from pandemicky circumstances, I assumed that it would turn out to be largely “transitory” (to use the Federal Reserve’s now “retired” description of elevated inflation).

So why this JOLTS-y post? Because this morning’s latest report, which takes the story through November, does show signs of normalization in those jobs quits. To be sure, the absolute numbers of quits hit yet another record – 4.527 million. In fact, that total represents the seventh straight month in which this quits level topped the pre-CCP Virus high of 3.627 million, set in July, 2019.

As known by RealityChek regulars, though, absolute numbers don’t provide the entire, or even the most important parts of, a picture. In this case, that’s because the numbers of employed Americans have grown substantially since the JOLTS series began at the end of 2000. What matters more is the quits rate – the percentage of the employed leaving their positions.

For non-farm workers (the Labor Department’s U.S. employment universe), this rate, at three percent in November, is still well above the pre-pandemic high of 2.4 percent – which also came in 2019 (in February, July, and August), as well as in April, 2001. But it’s barely risen on net since April’s 2.8 percent.

For private sector workers, the recent quits rates movement is less dramatic, and that’s more important for judging the transitory-ness of the Great Resignation – because the private sector is much bigger than the public, and the trends shaping it are much more reflective of market forces, not politicians’ decisions.

But it still seems worth noting that even though it rose to a record 3.4 percent in November (significantly higher than the pre-pandemic record 2.8 percent, set back in January, 2001, the private sector quits rate has been pretty stable since coming in at 3.3 percent in August.

Two caveats need to be mentioned, though. First, these November results are preliminary. Second, they predate the arrival in the United States of the CCP Virus’ highly infectious Omicron variant, which threatens to roil labor markets once again for the foreseeable future. One thing’s for sure – it’s time for me to renew monitoring these JOLTS reports!

(What’s Left of) Our Economy: U.S. Real Wage Decline is Really Widespread

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CCP Virus, child care, coronavirus, COVID 19, elder care, health care, inflation adjusted wages, labor shortages, nursing, real wages, supply chain, trucking, wages, warehousing, workers, Wuhan virus, {What's Left of) Our Economy

A Facebook exchange I was involved in last night prompted me to check the U.S. government data to find out how widespread was the trend of falling real wages – and by definition falling living standards. And the answer is: incredibly widespread – including in supply chain-related sectors where crippling labor shortages are often blamed for much of the bottleneck problem that has helped fuel inflation by reducing the supply of goods sought by Americans.

The exchange began when a Facebook friend posted her view that the U.S. economy was doing far better than gloomy press reports indicated. I countered with my “putting people first” argument that falling living standards meant that the economy was failing in its fundamental mission: improving Americans’ material lives. My interlocutor responded by claiming that the unusually large number of unfilled job openings have appeared during the stop-and-start recovery from the brief but steep CCP Virus-induced downturn showed that many Americans falling behind economically could easily improve their lot by taking jobs in higher paying industries.

I could have answered by pointing out how many Americans in low-paying jobs in particular lack the training to move that wage ladder. But I was more struck by the pervasiveness of the recent decline in inflation-adjusted hourly pay – which shows that even those able to make that transition will find themselves on a downward moving escalator for the time being.

Specifically, I looked at price-adjusted wage trends on a November, 2020-November, 2021 basis for the eight broadest categories tracked by the Bureau of Labo Statistics (BLS). They are: mining and logging; construction; manufacturing; trade, transportation and utilities; information services; professional and business services; leisure and hospitality; and miscellaneous services.

How many of these eight sectors saw real wage declines between the two Novembers? Seven. Leisure and hospitality was the lone exception, and it’s the lowest paying of these categories by far. The constant dollar wage out-performance there was indeed encouraging, but with these hourly earnings still only standing at $6.88 in 1982-84 dollars – versus $11.13 for the private sector as a whole – I wouldn’t claim economic success just yet.

(As known by RealityChek regulars, BLS doesn’t monitor wages in the public sector because there, pay is determined mainly by politicians’ decisions, not economic fundamentals.)

The names of these eight sectors, however, make clear that they’re so broad that they could include subsectors where the story’s very different. And that’s true even for a number of what might be called pandemic-specific sectors with lots of job openings – but only sometimes.

For example, the enormous national healthcare sector is part of the business and professional services grouping, where real hourly wages of $13.44 – higher than the private sector average – are off by a little over one percent so far this year. But for healthcare alone, they’re up by just under one percent (to a lower $12.13, though).

Dig deeper, and you find that after-inflation wages for hospitals, nursing care facilities, elder care facilities, and child care services, have risen, too. But except for hospital workers (a broad, relatively high paying category itself), hourly wages in 1982-84 dollars in none of these sectors is anywhere close to even a measly $10. And none has seen year-on-year wage increases of more than 1.95 percent (for hospital workers).

The wage situation is even worse in many of the supply chain-related industries within the trade, transportation, and utilities super-sector. For example, next time you hear about a dire nation-wide shortage of truck drivers, keep in mind that their real wages have decreased by 3.67 percent annually as of November. And workers at those equally strained warehouses? They’re only off by 0.25 percent. But they’re supposed to be desperate to hire! What gives?

The most obvious answer to me is that a supposed labor shortage in a sector where real wages are decreasing is really a tale of inadequate pay. But that’s a subject for another post – or six. For today, though, it seems abundantly clear that the headline real wage decline number isn’t masking lots of workers gaining ground, and that if you view that standard as the main test of an economy’s success, America’s is definitely flunking.

Im-Politic: A Labor Shortage Story Short on the Facts

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Bloomberg.com, Boris Johnson, Brexit, editing, European Union, globalism, Im-Politic, Immigration, Joe Mayes, journalism, labor shortages, media bias, Open Borders, truck drivers, truckers, trucking, United Kingdom

Is Bloomberg.com trying to make yours truly look good? It certainly seems that way. Exactly two days after I wrote that American journalism has long been suffering from an editing crisis (and subjecting readers and viewers to a flood of ineptly reported and reasoned articles, posts, and broadcast segments), this news site ran a piece illustrating perfectly two of this so-called profession’s biggest (and intimately related) flaws: pushing narratives largely by ignoring information that provides crucial context.

The lead paragraph tells you all you need to know where Joe Mayes’ September 22 story was going (and where he and his editors believed it should go): “The red lines of Boris Johnson’s Brexit project are starting to crack as voters face growing shortages of food and fuel, as well as a marked rise in living costs.”

As the second paragraph elaborated, “Despite riding to power on a Brexit campaign that pledged to cut immigration from the European Union, the prime minister [Johnson] and his cabinet are now preparing for what would be a significant and politically damaging U-turn: Tapping those same EU workers to plug the labor shortages crippling parts of the U.K. supply chain.” And “the most immediate and pressing concern”? “A major shortage of truck drivers.”

What could be more revealing – and embarrassing for supporters of the United Kingdom’s 2016 decision to leave the European Union (in large part to gain more national control over immigration inflows)? Immigrants from the same EU are now being recognized even by the Leaver-in-Chief as that country’s last hope for staving off starvation, freezing to death this winter, and raging inflation.

No question Brexit was a landmark decision, and no doubt there were plenty of valid reasons to be skeptical (as the close 2016 referendum results indicate). But this Bloomberg piece plainly suggests that the countries that have decided to remain in the EU literally have truckers to spare the British.

Which insinuates that the Brexiteers deserve to have insult added to injury. Except this story line is a crock. As an internet search that took me mere minutes revealed, there’s lots of info out there making clear that truck driver shortages are a global problem – that is, they’re not limited to countries that left the EU. Indeed, this industry website reports that trucking companies in Europe are expecting a 17 percent driver shortfall this year.

Further, the survey it’s based on found that any number of steps could be taken by trucking companies and governments in shortage-afflicted countries to increase driver supply without importing foreigners. Like raising pay. Like lowering the training age to encourage more young people to replace retiring truckers (a big problem in a sector with an aging workforce). Like creating safer parking areas, which would be especially helpful in attacting more women into the business. (They currently make up only two percent of drivers globally, according to the survey.)

In fact, finding such ;material is so easy that it raises the question of whether the main problem (and all the others I’ve spotlighted on RealityChek – e.g., here) doesn’t reflect simply a competence crisis. It also reflects a bias crisis, with the target being any measures or information that clash with longstanding globalist orthodoxies – in this case, Open Borders- friendly policies on the immigration and labor shortage fronts.