2025/9/4 :Why Labor Shortages and High Unemployment Coexist
Why Labor Shortages and High Unemployment Coexist
We often hear two claims that seem to contradict each other:
🔹 Societies face severe labor shortages.
🔹 Unemployment rates remain high.
How can both be true?
The answer lies in structural fatigue. What we call “labor shortage” usually refers to blue-collar work—caregiving, logistics, construction, service jobs. What we call “unemployment” often reflects white-collar layoffs in offices and tech.
Technology accelerates faster than education can adapt. Populations age faster than labor systems adjust. Workplaces demand more for less, while people resist jobs that feel degrading or unsustainable. The result is not a lack of people, but a lack of alignment.
This mismatch is not unique to Japan—it echoes in the United States, Europe, and beyond. The system runs on an old map that no longer matches the terrain.
Perhaps the cracks we see—labor shortages alongside unemployment—are not contradictions, but signals: an invitation to boundary crossing, to imagine new ways of connecting people, skills, and meaning in work.
#structuralfatigue #boundarycrossing #Economy #Society #Philosophy #Arbeitsmarkt #Zukunft
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