(The Center Square) – Workers in Ohio seem to be using a tight labor market to find more money and better terms.
The annual State of Working in Ohio produced by Policy Matters Ohio and released Monday also shows employers continue to struggle to hold down wages while searching for new, cheaper labor sources.
“Today’s tight labor market is the labor market Ohio needs,” said Policy Matters Ohio economist and the report’s lead author, Michael Shields. “Strong demand for workers is helping many Ohioans realize the gains blocked from them for four decades, when workers produced record wealth nearly every year, only to have their employers, shareholders and the wealthiest capture nearly all the gains. Policymakers should do all they can to sustain this growth and extend it to parts of the state it hasn’t reached yet.”
The report showed the state has restored the jobs lost during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the recovery is centered around major metro areas, and most Ohio communities continue to show job shortages.
Also, many are using the favorable labor market to improve their working conditions by leaving bad jobs for better ones, demanding better terms for hiring or joining with their coworkers under the banner of a union.
At the same time, the recent pay growth has not been enough to reverse what the report calls widening inequality between more- and less-privileged workers.
Based on MIT’s living wage calculator, a family of four with two working parents must be paid $24.53 per hour, meaning Ohioans aren’t paid enough to cover the basics until they reach the 60th percentile of all working people in the state.
“The rapid recovery from the COVID recession reflects the fact that federal policymakers met the crisis head-on with a response scaled to the need,” Shields said. “The recovery has now led to a growth economy that is creating long overdue opportunities for workers to secure wage gains, and new work opportunities for those most likely to face joblessness. Policymakers should support working people’s efforts to reclaim their share of the growth they have been building all along.”
