工作，工人，更多 & 少

工作和劳动力

Permit me please to digress a moment from commercial real estate in San Antonio and look at a larger issue – jobs.  这当然与商业地产有关, 因为, 毕竟, that is where jobs get done and where people work.

We are all well familiar with the Pandemic Two-Step: close jobs down to stop the contagion, 然后重新开门，再试着找工人.  现在我们到了第三步(是的, that is clumsy for a two-step but clumsy applies here) – right sizing our workforce for the Next Normal, while the FED raised interest rates to squelch hiring. Let’s consider all the variables, 因为 there are a bunch!

就业增长

Co-Star tells us that recently the Labor Department revised its job numbers, saying “the previous reports showed monthly job gains averaging 375,000 in 2022, 新数据显示，每月平均新增就业岗位为401个,000 . . . The revisions showed job growth to be stronger in each of the final seven months of the year in 2022. 此外, preliminary figures show that firms added an additional 517,1月份就业人数为1000人, 是175的两倍多,这是普遍预期的.”

So, despite the FED’s efforts to slow inflation by slowing the economy, instead the overall job market is full speed ahead. One sector, however, that did get hit hard is real estate.  The FED’s interest rate hikes nearly stopped real estate in Q4 2022.

目前，美国.S. has nearly 11-million job openings available for hiring new workers. That means there are nearly two jobs available for every unemployed person! 美国.S. 失业率刚刚从3%下降.5% to 3.4%，这是自1969年以来50年来的最低点.  是的, we are having layoffs by many firms who over-hired to meet the Covid demand on their services and goods and now must cut costs. 然而, many employers are going to hold on to the employees that they had such a hard time enticing back to work. Why would they lay off good people and then try to hire them back yet again? Saying goes, ‘you can’t fire someone you didn’t hire.’

安静的辞职者和工作机会

Do you expect as do I, that the “quiet quitters” are the first to be laid off?  Do you suspect that those who opted to not return from Work-From-365bet苹果客户端 are the ones the boss now finds the easiest to let go?  The boss is going to find it easier to release someone he/she doesn’t know very well, doesn’t come into the office and no one will really miss.  But then there is a job available right around the corner for this newly laid-off employee, 所以重新就业真的没有问题, 如果你想要一份新工作.

有这么多的职位空缺, it is a good sign that the actual labor participation rate rose from 62.3% to 62.4%. 然而，我们在63.4% pre-pandemic and the record high was in 2000 at 67%. So, that is a reduction of a couple of million people who could work but don’t. 也许, some are folks who decided to be stay-at-home parents during the Pandemic when they found out how bad the schools were. Or GenZ’s that dropped out to go back to live with mom and dad. Or 3-million folks who retired early during the pandemic.

劳动力短缺

我们确实非常缺乏教师, 会计师, 工程师, 飞行员, 医生, 护士, 兽医, 卡车司机, 焊工, 水管工, A / C修理工, 以及许多其他行业(律师除外). To an extent this represents our Middle Class, which is shrinking.  Sadly, the people coming across our southern borders do not generally have these professional skills. And, sadly, our dysfunctional legal immigration system only handles about ½-million people per year.  D.C. 不能/不行动呢.

低出生率

加上劳动力短缺，我们在美国.S. are now reproducing at such a low rate that our population is actually declining; 1.每个母亲生育7个孩子，而盈亏平衡率为2个.1出生.  Fewer people mean lower productivity and that leads to a lower GDP for the entire nation.  Can robots and AI take up the slack in the worker shortage? Doubt it can do more than slightly lessen the shortage.  以自动驾驶卡车为例.

在坚果壳里

总结一下:1)我们的通货膨胀太高了. 2) So the FED raises interest rates to try to squelch pay increases (ouch) and raise the unemployment rate.  利率是美联储唯一的工具. Too bad when you need a screw driver, all you have is a hammer. 3)但, 失业率降至50年来的最低水平, 4) and we are very short of trained people in every job category, 5) and we are looking at a long-term decline in population making the labor shortage even more critical, 6) and this reduces our productivity and eventually our standard of living in the U.S. (此处插入愁眉苦脸).

San Antonio is the top ranked city for growth in 2022

好消息是. 我们生活在ASA-MSA, 也就是奥斯汀-圣安东尼奥走廊, where we are racking up some pretty strong rankings.  San Antonio is the top ranked city for growth in 2022 and the top city for home building for 2023, 根据全国房地产经纪人协会的数据. The Federal Reserve Board reports that, though labor demand is softening in the U.S. and in Texas, San Antonio is still performing better than both.

对圣安东尼奥的预测是1比1.5% growth this year; not slamming but not a decline.  Then, New Braunfels is the fifth fastest growing ‘small city’ in the U.S. and the city council says they will be out of land to develop by 2035.  Our area’s affordability and pleasant life style remains appealing to a nationwide audience, drawing in more relocations from less attractive states and cities.

进入下一个正常状态

Reports I get from my commercial and residential real estate contacts say that the freeze brought on last Fall by the FED’s rate hikes has now turned to an early thaw this year.  谢谢，先生。. 土拨鼠.  经济活动正在恢复正常, or, at least the Next Normal as the interest rate shocks of last year have been absorbed, 适应，我们也适应了.  迫不及待想看看接下来会发生什么.