I have tried to compile a list of the mysterious expressions used in the article: - "labour markets have tightened" - "unemployment rate" - "unemployment was

I have tried to compile a list of the mysterious expressions used in the article: - "labour markets have tightened" - "unemployment rate" - "unemployment was much higher" - "fall in union membership" - "rising offshoring" - "outsourcing" - "workers’ bargaining power" - "tightening in labour markets might yet boost workers’ bargaining power" "as was the case during the late 1990s and late 2000s" - "number of part-time workers who want full-time jobs" - "unemployment rates that are far higher" - "pockets of slack might constrain wages everywhere" - "firms that are struggling to find workers" - "If slack were eliminated everywhere, pay might rise faster" - "boost real wages by running labour markets hotter" Now, I'm no economist, but the picture I'm getting is that they are describing labor relations as a "market", where prices (wages) are affected by demand (companies seeking employees) and supply (workers seeking jobs). So the idea would be that when the supply of potential workers increases (because unemployment is high, or because new sources of labor are available, e.g. by outsourcing and offshoring) that tends to drive wages down, and when the supply decreases it tends to drive wages up. The fly in the ointment of my interpretation is that there is at least one other obvious source of increased labor supply in rich countries, yet the Economist does not mention it anywhere. So I must be misunderstanding it, after all.