shortage vs deficiency

shortage and deficiency both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
shortage	Yes	No	No	No
deficiency	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, deficiency is a hypernym of shortage; that is, deficiency is a word with a broader meaning than shortage:

shortage: the property of being an amount by which something is less than expected or required
deficiency: lack of an adequate quantity or number

Other hypernyms of shortage include inadequacy, insufficiency.

As nouns, deficiency is a hypernym of shortage; that is, deficiency is a word with a broader meaning than shortage:

Other hypernyms of shortage include lack, want.

shortage (noun)	deficiency (noun)
the property of being an amount by which something is less than expected or required	lack of an adequate quantity or number
an acute insufficiency	the state of needing something that is absent or unavailable