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Ahead of the United Kingdom government’s Oct. 27 budget announcement, CEOs from more than 200 businesses have signed a petition asking Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak to keep value-added taxes down at the current level of 12.5% and not to increase it back to the pre-pandemic level of 20%. Companies that signed the petition include Hilton, IHG Hotels & Resorts, Marriott International and Mitchells & Butlers.

Kate Nicholls, CEO of UKHospitality, the hotel and hospitality membership organization which spearheaded the petition, said, “Under current plans, VAT returns to its pre-pandemic level of 20% next April, meaning higher prices for consumers just at the time when they can least afford it. For businesses, it will undoubtedly set off an inflationary spiral which will undermine wage growth, hit demand and ultimately threaten jobs.”

Analysts covering the hotel industry believe the key performance metrics for hotel brands and real estate investment trusts won't be as meaningful as forward-looking commentary and the possibility of soon-to-be-announced deals, Hotel News Now’s Sean McCracken reports.

Demand patterns and performance during the fourth quarter are not going to be what investors are most interested in or what management teams are most focused on during the upcoming third quarter earnings season, analysts said. Instead, earnings calls are likely to be dominated by optimistic commentary for the trajectory of demand in 2022.

In light of last week’s record-low numbers in regard to U.S. jobless claims, company chief financial officers are stating they are spending more on hiring and retaining employees, and are prepared to offer tempting perks and bonus structures, the Wall Street Journal reports.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, approximately 4.3 million workers in August handed in notices, a phenomenon the newspaper has coined the “Great Resignation." It said the trend is “exacerbating skills shortages across industries and forcing companies to pay more, driving up costs at a time of already high inflation.” According to one recent survey, by Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, “wage bills are forecast to rise by 6.9% this year and next, while wages for new hires are set to rise by about 10%.”

As more staff return to workplaces, there remains much evidence that COVID-19 is not disappearing. The latest mass event to fall victim to the ongoing pandemic is the Beijing Marathon, which was canceled Monday, six days before the 30,000-person event was due to have taken place, according to the BBC. Chinese authorities also have closed the borders of Gansu Province and banned tour groups from visiting other parts of the country.

The news outlet added China has stuck to its strategy of imposing strict lockdowns and undertaking mass testing and vaccination campaigns. According to Chinese officials, 75.6% of China’s population, or 1.068 billion people, had received both vaccinations. In the U.K., there have been increasing calls for employees to continue to work from home, a strategy the government is not eager to pursue as it seeks to counter rises in transmissions around the delta variant of coronavirus, the BBC added.

The Austrian government is proposing in new legislation not yet made law that a possible new lockdown would be applied only to those who have not been vaccinated, according to Bloomberg News, which quoted Austria’s chancellor Alexander Schallenberg as saying “I will do everything I can to ensure that the health system in this country does not reach its limit and is not overloaded because we have too many procrastinators.”

According to Reuters, approximately 11.4 million Austrians have been vaccinated, which, assuming everyone requires two doses of vaccine, equates to 64.1% of the population as of Oct. 25. Many countries around the world are grappling with what to do with those who do not wish to be vaccinated.

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