The notion of labor shortage relies on the assumption that productivity is the same, but there is a opposite offsetting effect that's comparable (stronger? weak

The notion of labor shortage relies on the assumption that productivity is the same, but there is a opposite offsetting effect that's comparable (stronger? weaker? who knows, but IMHO of a similar magnitude) - structural unemployent caused by increased automation, as the electronics and AI systems become both more capable and cheaper. There are already many jobs which could be done better by machines, but it's simply cheaper to pay peanuts to a person instead - and as soon as the machine becomes cheaper and/or wages grow that the person is 1% more expensive than the machine, that profession will shrink in numbers. It's counterproductive to try to grow a workforce segment that's likely not be needed soon. If there indeed is a labor shortage for some years, the society will handle the increased wage cost (which also imply increased push for automation) much better than it can handle a large segment of angry unemployed people, so while the future is unclear, it's better (at least for the society - the billionaires definitely benefit from cheap desperate potential workforce) to err on the side of doing less to solve this "problem" rather than doing too much.