Carole Ferry, edited by Thibaud Le Meneec 09h00, August 27, 2021

The Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, asked the sectors in tension, which lack manpower, to make an effort in terms of wage increases to attract more candidates.

Europe 1 asked business leaders if they intended to follow this injunction.

DECRYPTION

The bosses made their comeback this week with the "REF", the annual meeting of the Medef at the Longchamp racecourse, with fairly unanimous optimism on the economic return.

However, there is a shadow on the table: the question of wages.

While certain sectors such as catering, construction, the medico-social have difficulty recruiting, the Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire called on entrepreneurs to increase salaries to attract applications.

"We're just asking for that, but…"

"It makes me laugh, I'm not hiding you!"

This is what Anthony Cremmer Capocci thinks of the solution proposed by Bruno Le Maire.

His Italian food truck company is booming, he would like to recruit and is convinced that better wages would help him.

But, when it comes time to take stock, he is backing down.

We are only asking that, to be able to increase salaries if behind, we are perhaps a little less burdened ", he explains." I prefer to give a higher salary to a person who gives body and soul to my company and maybe give a little less to the state, for example. "

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This labor shortage has worsened with the Covid-19.

Hydrotherapy, for example, had no recruitment problem before the crisis.

Today, there are 15 to 20% of unfilled jobs in this sector.

Should we then attract potential candidates with better salaries?

"The thermal establishments have already suffered heavy losses, with a very significant drop in attendance of around 60% in 2020", sweeps Claude Eugène Bouvier, the general delegate of the national council of thermal establishments.

"We don't really have any leeway to be able to significantly increase the level of remuneration."

Medef's warning

If this shortage of manpower persists, companies will have no other choice than to revalue wages, a constant of the law of supply and demand on the labor market. This is what the president of Medef Geoffroy Roux de Bézieux recalled. With this warning: to increase wages, it means to increase prices, by the effect of inflation. The leader therefore invites everyone to question the

low cost

economy

.