While unemployment is at record highs, our customers constantly complain about the difficulty of finding good employees. It has always been difficult to find good people, but you would think the recent recession and construction downturn would make the process easier. So what is driving this shortage?
It’s not just your problem. Retiring baby boomers and technology requirements are placing a strain on the system. A February 2012 article in the Washington Post quoted a Deloitte study for The Manufacturing Institute which showed 600,000 job openings in the manufacturing industry. That same article quoted Boeing as saying that of their 31,000 machinists, 28 percent are over 55 years of age.