Opinion: How do we fix this "worker shortage"?

I keep reading and hearing about this "worker shortage", and to be frank about it, it pisses me off. I understand that sounds strong, but the truth is that there isn't a worker shortage. There is not a shortage of workers; the painful truth is that this is as close to a general worker strike as we may ever see. 

Before the pandemic even started, people were still having a hard time finding suitable employment, or were underemployed, and most people were handcuffed to jobs that left them wanting for whatever reason. When the pandemic hit, and people got laid off they had an opportunity to do other things. 

Some people went back college, some people took the unemployment money and started their own business, and some were just enjoying making the most money they've ever made since they started working. Seriously, some people were making upwards of $2k per month and the most they were making before the pandemic working one full time job was $1500 a month. 

Whatever the case, people were, and are, looking for something better. Now that employers are hiring again people have taken the time to apply to jobs that are paying more. Retail stores and some restaurants have said they're increasing their starting pay to $15/hr., so anyone who was making less than that is obviously going to apply for those jobs causing a lot of people to jump ship leaving other employers high and dry. Rightfully so too; why be loyal to a company that is paying you less when you can make more somewhere else? 

At the end of the day, what we're seeing now isn't a worker shortage. What we're seeing is people choosing to find better employment. What we're seeing is people choosing to hold out for something better, and there's really only one way to fix it, and it's certainly not by trying to bring back child labor. 

Any employer that wants to get ahead of this "worker shortage" needs to realize that it's not a worker shortage, and that really is the first step. The next step is to look at the business and see how they can improve the pay of the people already on staff. If that means letting someone, or a few extra people, pick up some overtime that way the business doesn't have to hire a whole extra person, then that's what needs to happen. Once that's done, the business needs to look at how they are going to pay people moving forward and incorporate that into the long term goals. 

Some businesses will need to work for a few years to generate enough income to bring on new staff, but it will benefit the business overall in the long run because competition is fierce on the job market and anyone that isn't able to adapt to the changing job market will get left behind. 

I know some will make the argument that some places will go out of business, but no one was worried about that when Walmart started to get as big as it is now, did they? No one was making that argument when Amazon knocked other businesses out of the market? Businesses close their doors all the time, and if there is a person out there running a business that would rather close their doors than try to figure out a way to make sure they can at least get people something close to a livable wage then they need to be out of business anyway. 

It's been far too long that business owners and these huge corporations get away with being profitable partly because they pay people what are tantamount to slave wages. People deserve more than working more than 80 hours a week chasing paychecks with shit to show for it.