(Note: this post is specifically regarding the US but I'm sure it crosses borders in many ways)
I just really don't understand why companies (depending on size) would rather lose thousands to millions of dollars in revenue monthly over offering competitive wages and being fully staffed. It's not even about greed at this point as they're literally hemorrhaging cash by refusing to make sure they're fully staffed.
I'm not going to pretend to understand exactly what is causing the labor shortage, but I do understand a couple basic concepts: Arithmetic doesn't lie, and people who don't actually give a shit about their jobs are going to gravitate towards whoever is willing to pay them the most. Even if the case was that people were making more staying home on unemployment (which it's not as all those programs dried up roughly a year ago, longer in many areas), so fucking what? I don't understand what has caused the shift of greedy business owners' attitudes of “money over everything” to “I just really need to hurt people even if I take myself down with them”.
As far as math goes, I'll use a vague example so as to not potentially out myself to my current employer if they browse reddit to illustrate my point.
There's a manufacturing plant which needs 10 people on the line to make sure (outside of a catastrophic failure) that any jam up can get resolved without having any downtime in an 8 hour shift. They can make 1,000 cases per hour worth $8/piece wholesale, so if they can stay running for first and second shift they can make $128,000 worth of product per day. Instead they have 7 people on each shift making $15/hour, for a labor cost of $1,680 per day and each shift has about 2 hours of downtime, resulting in only $96,000 dollars worth of product being made. Subtract the labor cost and that's $94,320 worth of revenue. I know that's an oversimplification because it doesn't account for utilities, machine maintenance, etc. but I'm trying to make a basic point.
If instead they were to pay those 7 people $20/hour as well as hire 3 more employees per shift, that would bring the labor cost up to $3200 per day which is nearly double, but it would also bring the net revenue up to the potential $128,000, and gross revenue to $124,800. That's $30,480 more revenue, a little over 32% uptick. How in the absolute fuck is that not worth it? As a fun exercise, if you're privy to information about how much your company makes daily and how much they pay employees you can do this same basic math at your place of employment.
Outside of the monetary gain, if they are under the impression that they have a lazy or unreliable employee they could easily be replaced. A company offering 33% more hourly wages over anyone else around is going to be flooded with applications, and also in turn employees who actually will work hard because they feel they're being treated more fairly. Maybe they even use all their newfound revenue to have a bonus program and further incentivize hard work.
I really, really just don't get it. All this is basic numbers too, completely taking out the human element where also the simple act of not being an egregious prick will also build employee loyalty. That aside, whatever happened to “you gotta spend money to make money”? This is such a fucking ass-backwards Bizarro World that we live in now.
I know wages haven't necessarily increased the same way everywhere, but here in Massachusetts minimum wage was $6.75/hour back in 2006. Everyone in the position to work those dead end jobs was completely hopeless so just floated through life trying to make the best of it. In January of 2023 it will be $15/hour. People are actually making enough where buying a house and ever retiring are more than just an unattainable dream, and as such they are more educated about how hard they're getting fucked by their employers. The lawmakers have prodded things in a way where we're on the precipice of everyone actually being prosperous, businesses could just take that one extra step and pay people enough to achieve their (arguably basic as hell) dreams of not paying rent and working until the day they die. In the process they would also make so much more money not only because people would care about their jobs, but because everyone would have more money to spend.
Instead they'd rather fight it tooth and nail, often times running their own businesses into the ground. And for what? Spite is the only thing I can think of. Malice? Back when it was just greed the world was shitty but it at least made sense. At least 20 years ago the American Dream was just that, a pipe dream, an unrealistic desire for far too large of a percentage of the population. I feel like we have truly entered the American Nightmare now.