Welcome to Sridhar’s newsletter number # 37 & Podcast (Click Play button for Audio version of the Post). Appreciate you being here, so we can connect weekly on interesting topics. Add your email id here to get this directly to your inbox.
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This weekly newsletter is mostly about the article, books, videos etc. I read or watch or my views on different topics which revolves around my head during the week. Now, let us dive into this week’s reads.
1. U.S Housing Market
There is huge shortage of homes in USA, This is very much known since more than 2 years now. Current U.S Market is so tight, that house listed on the market is closed in less than a week. In my area, seen few of the home sold on 2nd day of their Listing becoming active. So any prospective buyer, specially first time home buyers are left out of this race. This resulted home prices way beyond on their year on year growth. Prices are so high, but still many are going ahead and buying them at premium prices. At stock market as many say, Paying high price for something now and assuming it will go high further without any data points is a speculation. Home Prices currently are in same boat.
Other end, iBuyer concept ended up another hole in this process. iBuyer are organizations like Zillow, Redfin, Opendoor, who buy the houses from the market, flip them and then sell for profit. Zillow in recent days declared that it got the business wrong and its no longer revenue generating for them, as they bought so many home since last 2 years and now they are not able to sell the homes with a margin enough to run the business. Overall, housing market inventory issue is not getting resolved even in 2022 as projected by many economists.
One has to make their life’s biggest investment within a week and in hot areas on the spot or less than a day. Zillow coming out of the business is a sign for buyers not to panic and go into buying now ? Let me know your thoughts.
https://www.forbes.com/advisor/mortgages/housing-bubble-experts/
2. Surgeon General warns of mental health 'epidemic' for kids
U.S Surgeon from State of Union, General Vivek Murthy has released a advisory in December of 2021 about the mental health epidemic for kids. 1 out 5 kids suffer depression and 1 out of 4 kids suffer anxiety, Year by year depression, hopelessness, suicide rates have been going up, Covid has added additional spike to it now.
You can see the full advisory in below link,
Protecting Youth Mental Health The U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory
To add to fuel, Social media, Pop Culture bombard young kids with their media content, telling them they are not good looking enough, popular enough, smart enough or rich enough.
To take Action,
All have to recognize that mental health is an essential part of overall health. Mental health conditions are real, common, and treatable, and people experiencing mental health challenges deserve support, compassion, and care, not stigma and shame. Mental health is no less important than physical health. And that must be reflected in our how we communicate about and prioritize mental health.
Ensure that every child has access to high-quality, affordable, and culturally competent mental health care. Care should be tailored to children’s developmental stages and health needs, and available in primary care practices, schools, and other community-based settings. In regular day to day living as well, every child should have quality access to childcare, education, Healthy food, health care, stable housing, be in safe neighborhoods. Its call for action for every adult there, to have this better future for every kid.
For more insights, Do read the Advisory for sure.
3. Labor Shortage continues to 2022 as well
In 2021, the biggest buzz word over LinkedIn and over all workplaces was “The Great Resignation”. Pandemic has changed a wave against the employer by employees. The way number of people have quit jobs or not ready to join back or come back to offices, Quitting even without an job offer to get out of toxic work culture, you name it, Resignations were everywhere in 2021. The trend is going to continue in 2022 as well, it will be a job seeker market. In 2021, it was majorly for tech jobs, science, medical professional got the high paychecks for switching employers, as we move into 2022, this trend will go into other sectors as well, Food Industry is my top list and so does the minimum pay jobs will end up following Amazon , Walmart route, that is increasing pay for entry level or minimum pay jobs , paying for education and additional bonuses to have employees on their side.
Labor market is still tight, the reason for my choice of food industry was, Covid is going stay here, people who were fired during 2020 lockdown or were working 80 hours a week with minimal staff were highly burned out. So these jobs for sure no longer seen as secured jobs. So Food Industry if needs to survive in 2022, they have no option, so have to run the tide along with the job seeker. Higher Pay, Joining Bonuses, Promotions, 40hrs a week schedules, Diversity Equity and Inclusion, Higher Education support from employer, Health insurance all would need to have their staff size back to pre-pandemic level.
In US altogether a different problem, There are plenty of jobs on the market, but not many are looking to come back to workforce. Many who lost their jobs due to Covid Lockdown were either lived on their life savings or government given unemployment checks. During this non-working time, many realized how much their life is spent in work , which impacted their health, stress level, no work life balance jobs all these came to limelight to them. So many are not looking to join same jobs which they left in 2021. So people are adding additional skills to look for job opportunity in different sectors than compared to sector they worked prior to Pandemic. So there will be businesses who will find very hard to find their new employees. Also 2021 has more deaths due to Covid compared to 2020, So many had Covid or taking care of their loved one with Covid or child care by being at home and older population who got retired early also adds up.
See this Washington Post article specially for US job market,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/12/29/job-market-2021/
That is all for this week. See you again.
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