[JumpCrisscross]

> “paying existing workers more” didn’t make the list

That falls under tapping underutilized labor pools. You're trying to take someone not working and convincing them to work.

There's about 8% slack in labor-force participation to late-nineties peaks [1]. But per the article, some of that is retirement. It's not a long-term solution to rely on paying retirees to come back into the workforce.

When an individual company (or state) faces a shortage of workers, it's often due to pay. Idaho should pay its nurses more. When an entire economy faces a shortage, it's something more structural.

[1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CIVPART

[toomuchtodo]

As long as there are workers 18-65 who are willing to work at a clearing price who aren't currently working because that price isn't offered, there is labor available. Agree relying on retirees to remain in the workforce isn't a long term solution; there is no long term solution when you've built your economy on an ever expanding labor force that is no longer ever expanding. The data does not show we are out of workers entirely, but there are jobs workers are unwilling to take at the current wage on offer.

Will we face a structural labor shortage causing unreasonably low unemployment rates and labor marketplace friction in the near term? Very possibly depending on 55+ workforce exit rates and immigration flow. Are we there yet? I don't believe the data shows that.