Today someone posted an article about Jerome Powell (chair of the Fed) who is essentially telling companies that the increasing wages in labor market coupled with a surplus of jobs is resulting in the inflation we are seeing today. As a result the Fed will take action to forcibly reduce the outstanding number of jobs. I simply don’t agree.
I’m (23M) would be the perfect example of who he is talking about. At the beginning of COVID I was working 50+ hours a week for a little more than $50k. Mid way I was able to transition to a new position making $80k. I left that position last year to make $125k at another company. Here’s the kicker though. When I was at my first position I qualified for the stimulus and worked my ass off and still could barely make rent and had to play a game of what bill am I going to pay today . At my second position I was still in the same spot due to inflation but was able to pay my bills on time and finally go to the doctor to figure out several issues that had been affecting my quality of life for 4 years now. In my newest position I have just now been able go out to eat at a restaurant and treat my family and myself with some dignity.
I have been working in finance for Fortune 500 companies. Just had a call the other day about our gas business. We were literally told that the increase in gas price was not a supply issue and was primarily driven by an across the board price increase by our suppliers and we are just passing the cost along to our customers. We are making record profits in gas and our other operations. Another nice little example would be the call we had a few days ago where our leadership decided to promise Wall Street higher profit margins than our business had originally planned for, making it so that we are now in a mad scramble trying to cut costs and increase revenues that we were already in control of (which coincidentally will result in even higher prices? 🤔)
I was a bit on the fence about anti work but I just looked at our CEOs salary. I patted myself on the back when I got this new job saying I had finally made it. I make like 2500 a week. My CEO made $6M last year. That is $115k a week. Home Office workers also get bonuses that run 5-20% of our salary which we have been paying over 100% on due to our great business. Thing is our company’s CEO gets paid literally a fraction of the salary of other large companies.
This inflation isn’t an issue with people making $10 an hour asking to be paid a fair wage. It’s an issue of out of touch C level individuals who are making tens to hundreds of times what would be considered well off by most of the population being in charge of setting policy for everyone else. This is unfair and we need to stand up for ourselves.
Wrote this on my phone so sorry for any spelling errors.