MY friend and regular reader of IST Carl of “I Know I made You Smile”……https://carldagostino.wordpress.com/……ask a good question in one of his comments after reading one of my posts.

He had a problem with a statement made in post from last week…..”“Labor shortages are impeding job growth”….the statement is from this post…..https://lobotero.com/2019/06/07/closing-thought-07jun19/

His question fired me up to do what I truly enjoying doing…research…..so as promised here is the best answer that I could come up with since I am not an economist by trade it may get a bit techy…..

A common bit of confusion is between jobs and labor…..first what causes a labor shortage?

A labour shortage can be caused by a turn in economic conditions where there is a shortage of skilled workers for a given industry or overall job market. … Shortages can also be caused by a mismatch in skills, poor compensation, geographic location or ineffective recruitment by employers

Now the difference between Labor force and workers…..Employees are considered part of the labor force, but the terms “employees” and “labor force” don’t mean precisely the same thing. Not everyone in the labor force would fit the exact definition of an employee, since the labor force includes a much broader category of people. The labor force is a blanket term describing an entire collection of people either employed or seeking employment.

Is that confusing enough?

Maybe this short video will help…..

After writing this I realized that this may not answer the question Carl asked….I apologize if I made it more confusing.

Another reason I do not like economics…..too damn confusing and none of the “laws” seem to work without some sort of adjusting.