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Comment by beebmam | Hacker News Reader

I think it's a huge mistake. The great labor shortage is just beginning. You can thank the retiring boomers for that. (And I hope they enjoy their retirement!)

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There is no way to make a mistake here because there are essentially no consequences -- entities of this scale can rehire as easily as they fire.

At a lower average compensation rate too, most likely. These companies are basically refinancing their labor force using cruelty and fear. It is working because they're all doing it, because we let them. System working as intended.

> At a lower average compensation rate too, most likely.

highly doubt it. The labor force is shrinking. There's already a dearth of talented software devs. And then there will be huge upward pressure on wages from lower level jobs that now have to pay 20$ an hour to get workers.

People have been saying that for 50 years and it hasn’t happened in the US. Upward pressure on wages will result in interest rate increases to manufacture unemployment and keep wages down.

It's happening right now, in front of our very eyes, as predicted. Once the population shifted, it would happen. Here we are, take it in.

> entities of this scale can rehire as easily as they fire.

It's not exactly true. It actually takes quite a long time to hire competent employees, particularly more senior ones. Hence why it was so hard to hire in 2020-2021.

There is no such thing as a labor shortage. There are just insufficient wages.

This statement is missing qualifiers.

Consider the extreme counter-example: A small village of a dozen individuals sitting a top a mountain of gold is unlikely to be able to operate an industrial scale gold mining operation.

There can be too few people to do certain work. Nuclear plant operators. Ordinance disposal experts. Electricians in my area...

but hold on. "not having people" and "not having people with the skills you need" are different in this regard. Offering more money won't make more people, but it will motivate people to learn skills.

Sure but in the interim (while they're learning skills) you don't have as many as you want of nuclear reactor operators AKA a labor shortage.

Whether or not the real world has a true labor shortage or just a shortage for the current market price is not shown. i.e. if you offered more wages would some stay at home parents meet the demand?

There is a shortage of qualified and decent labor. Bodies <> Labor

That isnt true.

If the demand for brain surgeons doubled overnight, no amount of wage hike is going to magically double the supply of brain surgeons.

Sure it won't double it overnight, but if we give people enough time to train (4-8 years?) then I think it would have a significant effect. Though this example is poor because the quantity of new brain surgeons is restricted by various regulations and agreements (so we'd also have to assume those went away).

If you look at an unregulated field like software I think it's pretty clear that the huge increase in demand from ~2008-2020 did result in a huge increase in supply.

Right, so shortages can exist for any skillset that requires more than a few months to acquire.

In what way is it a mistake? Do you mean that the companies will suffer for it?

How many tech employees are boomers though? The youngest boomers today are 59 and IME 99% of tech employees are <55. Indeed I'd be surprised if boomers retiring had any significant effect on tech given most of them have already retired.

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