The jobs report came out this morning and to say it was underwhelming would be a huge understatement.

Economists expected a big number. They got next to nothing (266,000 jobs added). Of course, most of those jobs were re-hires.

Here's a simple fact: Job seekers are nonplussed about compensation.

Employers will have to pay more to get people back to work. That's it.

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As the economy re-opens post-COVID (ahem!), employers are trying to re-hire their employees that they laid off or find new ones to exploit hire. Except there is a problem: Workers don't want to go back.

Now, there are many reasons. One, maybe they are Dogecoin billionaires. Or they get more in unemployment than they would if they went back to their old job. Or they are afraid to go back to work for fear of contracting COVID-19.

Who knows. There are lots of reasons not to return to work.

The ONLY thing that has a snowball's chance in Hell is…wait for it…higher wages and salaries.

This is not the 1930s. There are plenty of jobs but no applicants. That's a real problem.

Money is a STRONG force that gets the unemployed back to work. I am not talking about a higher minimum wage. Many of the unfilled jobs are not minimum wage jobs. Of course, we can argue that we need a $15 an hour minimum wage. That's a slightly different discussion.

But that won't wholly solve this problem. This is a supply and demand problem only.

Employers have to pony up and pay people more. The jobs are there. The people are available. Wages are the glue that binds the two together.

That's it.

Oh, and we have to put COVID behind us. Fat chance on that happening any time soon. (Where I live, we're back to “phase 1” infection rates.)

News coverage on the anemic jobs report:

• US job growth slows sharply in sign of hiring struggles
• Economy adds 266K jobs in April, far below expectations

Buckle up. We're about to see just how resilient this economy is. (Note I've said it many times before: We need MORE stimulus. Not less. This is the Greater Depression. It could get as deep as it gets wide.

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Bill

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