The recovery in healthcare payrolls was short-lived, up just 49.6k in 2021. To put this into context, the US added 335.6k healthcare jobs in 2019.
Healthcare payrolls are still 2.73% below their February 2020 level: hospital payrolls have declined 1.83% over this period, while jobs in nursing & residential care facilities (-12.45%) have seen a much larger drop.
The US economy is forecast to add 11.9 million jobs between 2020 and 2030, according to the latest BLS projections. Over a quarter (3.3 million) of these jobs will be in healthcare and social assistance. The greater demand for a variety of healthcare services will be driven by continued population aging and increasing rates of chronic disease.
The stall in jobs growth across the healthcare sector in 2021 is remarkable in the context of these BLS forecasts and suggests that the acute supply/demand imbalance for workers in this sector will worsen.
Wages are already rising fast. The y/y for average hourly earnings of production & non-supervisory employees in the health care sector hit 9.17% in November, a series high.
Average hourly earnings have been a good lead indicator for the health care services deflator, which rose only 2.61% y/y in November. Health care is labour-intensive. Health care services prices may well accelerate this year.
