Boomers are retiring and there aren't enough young people to fill their shoes, which creates an imbalance between supply and demand for labor. >Finally, we com

Boomers are retiring and there aren't enough young people to fill their shoes, which creates an imbalance between supply and demand for labor. >Finally, we come to core services other than housing. This spending category covers a wide range of services ... constituting more than half of the core PCE index. ... Because wages make up the largest cost in delivering these services, the labor market holds the key to understanding inflation in this category. > >Comparing the current labor force with the Congressional Budget Office's pre-pandemic forecast of labor force growth reveals a current labor force shortfall of roughly 3-1/2 million people. ... excess retirements might now account for more than 2 million of the 3‑1/2 million shortfall in the labor force. > >What explains these excess retirements? ... many older workers lost their jobs in the early stages of the pandemic ... The cost of finding new employment may have appeared particularly large for these workers ... Also, gains in the stock market and rising house prices in the first two years of the pandemic contributed to an increase in wealth that likely facilitated early retirement for some people.