Biden tells restaurateur he’ll ‘be in a bind’ on hiring unless he pays workers more

President Biden told a restaurant owner at an Ohio town hall Wednesday night that he would likely struggle to hire new employees for the next few months before expanded federal unemployment benefits run out — unless he paid them more.

The restaurateur, who identified himself as John Lanni, a Republican, asked Biden during the CNN event in Cincinnati: “We employ hundreds of hard-working team members throughout the state of Ohio and across the country, and we’re looking to hire more every day. How do you and the Biden administration plan to incentivize those that haven’t returned to work yet? Hiring is our top priority right now.” “Two things,” Biden responded. “One, if you noticed, we kept you open. We spent billions of dollars to make sure restaurants can stay open, and a lot of people who now — who work as waiters and waitresses decided that they don’t want to do that anymore because there’s other opportunities at higher wages, because there’s a lot of openings now, jobs. People are beginning to move … There’s not much distinction between not going back to work in a restaurant and not going back to work at a factory. So people are looking to change opportunities, change what they’re doing.