{"id":15556,"date":"2021-10-29T21:42:27","date_gmt":"2021-10-29T21:42:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/2021\/10\/29\/businesses-set-to-raise-prices-and-wages-adding-to-inflation-concerns\/"},"modified":"2021-10-29T21:42:27","modified_gmt":"2021-10-29T21:42:27","slug":"businesses-set-to-raise-prices-and-wages-adding-to-inflation-concerns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/2021\/10\/29\/businesses-set-to-raise-prices-and-wages-adding-to-inflation-concerns\/","title":{"rendered":"Businesses set to raise prices and wages, adding to inflation concerns"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><\/div><p> \n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<nav aria-label=\"Breadcrumb\" class=\"breadcrumbs\">\n<h2 class=\"visually-hidden\">Breadcrumb Trail Links<\/h2>\n<ol class=\"breadcrumbs__items list-unstyled\">\n<li class=\"breadcrumbs__item\"> News <\/li>\n<li class=\"breadcrumbs__item\"> FP Work <\/li>\n<li class=\"breadcrumbs__item\"> FP Economy <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<\/nav>\n<p class=\"article-subtitle\"> Small and medium firms expect to raise prices by 3.9 per cent over the next year, the highest rate in more than a decade <\/p>\n<div class=\"article-meta\">\n<div class=\"published-by\">\n<p>Author of the article:<\/p>\n<p> <span class=\"published-by__author\">Bianca Bharti<\/span> <\/div><\/div>\n<figure class=\"featured-image\"><picture class=\"featured-image__ratio featured-image-category__economy\"><\/picture><figcaption class=\"featured-image__caption image-caption\"><span class=\"caption\">Mario Aricci, owner of Ponesse Foods at St. Lawrence Market in Toronto, on Sept. 15, 2021. <\/span> <span class=\"credit\">Photo by Ernest Doroszuk\/Toronto Sun\/Postmedia files<\/span> <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"\">\n<h2 class=\"visually-hidden\">Article content<\/h2>\n<p>Canadian businesses are planning to hike prices at the highest rate in more than a decade as inflation, supply-chain disruptions and labour shortages weigh on companies.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"\">\n<h2 class=\"visually-hidden\">Article content<\/h2>\n<p data-async=\"\">Small and medium firms expect to raise prices by 3.9 per cent over the next 12 months, according to a survey released this week by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. It is the highest bump in expectations since CFIB\u2019s Business Barometer began publishing in 2009.<\/p>\n<p data-async=\"\">\u201cCurrently, input and labour shortages are key obstacles for firms as they have impeded their ability to restore sales and ramp up production,\u201d Ksenia Bushmeneva, an economist at Toronto-Dominion Bank, wrote in a note Thursday. \u201cConsumer demand remains healthy, but meeting it amid shipment delays and higher input costs is a challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n<p data-async=\"\">The latest results play into a broader debate surrounding inflation, which has surged to its fastest pace since 2003 to 4.4 per cent, at a time when the economic recovery has hobbled along against expectations. Early estimates of gross domestic product in September show little change from lower-than-expected growth of just 0.4 per cent in August, Statistics Canada reported Friday. The uneven recovery has already proven tricky for the Bank of Canada as it deals with inflation surging past its mandated target of between one and three per cent.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"\">\n<h2 class=\"visually-hidden\">Article content<\/h2>\n<p>At the heart of the surging prices is lagging and disrupted supply to meet burgeoning demand, pushing up the cost of raw materials and goods. Close to a third of survey respondents indicated a shortage of input products is weighing on production growth, the highest level ever in the Business Barometer\u2019s history.<\/p>\n<p data-async=\"\">On top of that, the labour market, though it\u2019s fully recovered its pre-pandemic losses, still has sore points . The unemployment rate is at 6.9 per cent, still above the pre-pandemic trend. Nearly half of the firms in the CFIB survey said a shortage of skilled labour is placing limitations on sales or production growth, while 40 per cent said it\u2019s the same for unskilled labour. As a result of the shortage, respondents said they expect to raise wages 2.5 per cent.<\/p>\n<p>Supply and labour shortages have been affecting the firms\u2019 capacity utilization rate, which fell for the first time since May from 74.8 per cent to 73 per cent. Claire Fan, an economist at Royal Bank of Canada, cautioned reading \u201ctoo much\u201d into the drop as it\u2019s not seasonally adjusted data. \u201cBut, capacity issues that are limiting supply will put a floor under price growth in the near-term,\u201d Fan said.<\/p>\n<p data-async=\"\"><em>\u2022 Email: bbharti@postmedia.com | Twitter: <a class=\"twitter-follow-button\" data-evt=\"click\" data-evt-typ=\"User Interaction Click\" data-evt-val=\"{\" control_fields=\"\" source=\"\" type=\"\" name=\"\" target=\"\" url=\"\" vertical=\"\" position=\"\" pixels=\"\" link=\"\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/biancabharti\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">biancabharti<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/>\n<br \/>Businesses set to raise prices and wages, adding to inflation concerns<\/a><br \/>\n<br \/>2021-10-29 21:42:27<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Breadcrumb Trail Links News FP Work FP Economy Small and medium firms expect to raise prices by 3.9 per cent over the next year, the highest rate in more than&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":15557,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/smartcdn.prod.postmedia.digital\/financialpost\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/no1029inflation.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=288","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15556","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15556","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15556"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15556\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/media\/15557"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15556"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15556"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/api\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15556"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}