Wages as a factor in labour shortages

Wages as a factor in labour shortages

Wage levels have been suggested as one way to measure a labour shortage. However, this often does not match people's common perceptions. For example, if wages alone are the best measure of labour shortages, then that would imply that we should be importing doctors instead of farm workers because doctors are far more expensive than farm workers. However, there are institutionally-imposed limits on the number of doctors that are allowed to be licensed. If foreign migrant workers were not allowed into a nation, then farm wages may go up, but probably not enough to approach the wages of doctors.

The Atlantic slave trade (which originated in the early 17th century but ended by the early 19th century) was said to have originated due to perceived shortages of agricultural labour in the Americas (particularly in the American South). As this was the only means of malaria resistance available at the time.^[2] Ironically malaria seems to itself have been introduced to the "New World" via the slave trade.