 Official monetary policy in the US and Canada helped strengthen the boss's hand. While ostensibly aiming at fighting inflation, central bankers in both countries pursued measures that increased worker insecurity. In 2022, Tiff Macklem, governor of the Bank of Canada, argued that, quote, an increasingly tight labor market was driving inflation and called for restoring what he called labor market balance, a way of saying that he aimed to decrease workers' bargaining power.