There was never a worker shortage. What there has been is a re-evaluation by workers of the value of their own work. Even without Covid this would have happene

There was never a worker shortage. What there has been is a re-evaluation by workers of the value of their own work. Even without Covid this would have happened as low-income workers in many areas were either rapidly approaching being unequivocally priced out of living anywhere remotely near their work, or already were. Covid just forced the issue sooner and faster, rather than letting it fester. Why would anyone continue working for subsistence wages that can't even pay rent where they live and work? Their only sensible options are demanding more pay or leaving. In major cities, with current rents, it simply isn't feasible to pay janitors, garbage collectors, fast-food workers, restaurant employees, etc as little as they've been paid, for the very simple reason that they can't afford to live there on those wages. Unless we're willing to give up sanitation, garbage collection, fast food, and cheap restaurants in those cities, there is no reasonable solution except increasing wages. (There are of course unreasonable solutions such as exploiting immigrants, wage theft, and prison labor).