Joseph Tolbert was called back to work in the banquet department of the Washington Hilton for the first time since the start of the Pandemic.
The bad news is that he would not be able to support his two young kids.
The good news is that the work would last a few days while the hotel hosted a party.
I was laid off the next week.
In January alone, the U.S. economy added more than 450,000 jobs. The unemployment rate is 4%, down from a high of 15% in April 2020 and many employers are having a hard time recruiting. The labor market is the best it has been in years.
The leisure and hospitality sector was hardest hit by the Pandemic. Restaurants and hotels went dark as Americans stayed home. The jobs have returned in fits and starts, but they have not returned evenly.
He still misses his job at the hotel. Thanks to his collective bargaining agreement, he was able to get a good union job that paid more than $24 per hour. He didn't pay for his health insurance plan or pension through his union.
It seems like anything else is a downgrade.
The 46-year-old said that he couldn't find anything comparable.
The majority of leisure and hospitality work is done by food service. The jobs in that industry are down 8% from February 2020. Even though jobs in the smaller accommodations industry are still down 22%, workers like Tolbert are no longer sure if they will get a job.
The job losses were disproportionately happening in leisure and hospitality, and that's where they remain, according to a senior economist at the Economic Policy Institute think tank.
Thanks to a steep decline in business travel, hotelOccupancy rates are still below pre-pandemic levels. Business travel will not recover to its current levels for another two years according to the American Hotel and Lodging Association.
Hotels have reduced services during the Pandemic and may now see it as a way to cut labor costs over the long term. Some hotels now encourage guests to forgo daily room cleaning during their stays, and have scaled back on room service and other aspects of hotel stays.
In California and Arizona, it is a constant struggle to get people back into hotel jobs, according to the co-president of Unite Here Local 11.
Chris Nassetta said in February that the company was focused on making higher-margin businesses and creating more labor efficiencies. At its high-end hotel lines, including the Waldorf-Assaut and other lines, the company is maintaining daily service.
The amount of work is determined by market demand and local business environments, according to a Hilton spokesman. The question of daily housekeeping was left to guests, according to the spokesman.
About 30% of Unite Here's members still haven't returned to their old jobs because of the determination to cut back services.
He said that it was all about profit.
Unionized hotels call workers back to work after layoffs. The higher the worker's tenure at the hotel, the more likely they are to return to work. Only the most senior employees will be rehired if the hotel only rehires a few positions. L ayoffs and callbacks have been a feature of the hotel industry for a long time, but the waits were usually shorter before the pandemic.
Linda said she has been called back to work on occasion over the past two years, usually for a few days at a time. She loves her job at the hotel and doesn't think she could improve upon the more than $22 per hour she earns there.
She said she would have lost her apartment if it weren't for the rental assistance program.
I'm a mess, and I'm desperate to get back to work.
She gets calls from other workers when the hotel might need them. An Omni spokesman did not respond to questions about staffing levels. The Unite Here Local 25 said the Omni Shoreham has agreed to maintain daily housekeeping during the Pandemic.
The hotel might be trying to do more with less.
They have work for us, but they aren't bringing us back.
Despite the tight labor market, some hotel workers are taking less appealing jobs to stay afloat.
The hotel where Valencia worked had a Union Square Hotel. She had affordable health and dental coverage for her family. Rodolfo worked in the facilities department at the hotel. They lost their jobs at the start of the Pandemic and were unable to find similar-paying work.
Valencia said that some of the women with more experience get called in occasionally. She is on the lower end of the list.
She said that the hotel doesn't want to bring workers back.
Valencia got a job at Walmart that pays $17 per hour. That may sound decent for retail work, but it's a $10-per-hour pay cut compared to her union job, with worse benefits. Her husband was called back to the hotel after working twice the hours at half his old pay rate. They have two young daughters.
Valencia said that they were very squeezed for money.
Valencia and her husband are immigrants from Mexico City. Minority groups have been hardest hit by the job losses because they are more likely to be employed in industries like leisure and hospitality.
Black and Hispanic women were found to be the most affected by job losses within that sector. Workers in managerial roles were more likely to be spared.
There is a race and gender story.
In March 2020, Nely Reinante lost her job at the Waikiki Beach Resort. She was laid off again in the summer after waiting 15 months for her first callback. She was offered temporary work during the holiday season.
She said that if there was daily cleaning we would all get back to work.
The hotel work has been so irregular that a career training program was needed to become a pharmacy technician. She was able to get an internship at a local pharmacy where she made around 14 dollars per hour. She made close to $26 per hour.
She said that there are many jobs out there, but not with as much pay as the hotel.
She joined other union workers on a December trip to Northern Virginia where they delivered a petition demanding that daily housekeeping be restored. Unite Here said they had gathered 20,000 signatures.
While completing her pharmacy internship, she holds out hope that more full-time housekeeping will return. Some of her coworkers have given up and moved on, while others get prepared for work in the morning and head to their hotel in hopes of getting the call.
We don't know if we'll have a regular job.
All Rights Reserved © 2024
