Nix $300? Sure. Raise minimum wage? Yes. But so much more is needed to fill jobs By: Associated Press May 27, 2021
3:03 pm
The biggest cause of Wisconsin’s workforce shortage isn’t the extra $300 a week the federal government is paying unemployed people, though that benefit should end.
Nor is the main culprit our state’s stagnant minimum wage, which needs to increase.
The biggest hurdle before and after the pandemic remains the same: Wisconsin is graying fast and doesn’t have enough young people to replace older workers as they retire, much less to fill the new positions that growing businesses create.
Cities in the U.S. heartland have turned into hubs for immigration, a new study shows, helping in some cases to reverse generations of declining birthrates.
Close
In this Sept. 2, 2020 file photo, a passer-by walks past a business storefront with a space for rent sign in a window in Boston. Business applications were the highest on record in 2020, up 24% from the previous year. You may be considering joining that trend if you donât want to return to an office or were laid off during the pandemic.
Steven Senne - The Associated Press File Photo
By AMRITA JAYAKUMAR
NerdWallet
SHARE
Maybe you’re cringing at the thought of going back to an office. The seed of a business idea floats around in your head between work video calls, after the kids are asleep or while you tend your pandemic garden. Or perhaps you were laid off during the pandemic and forced to work for yourself, and now you’re wondering if you should continue down this path.
“Covid-19 was a social, cultural and emotional shock the likes of which we have not experienced for generations. Becoming an entrepreneur is a deeply personal decision, and the pandemic may have delivered the push for many to embrace it,” according to a February report by the Economic Innovation Group, a Washington-based think tank.