Minnesota hospitality businesses, especially restaurants, are still struggling to regain their workforces following a shutdown last year, and the ongoing pandemic.
Many in the industry are cutting back hours, days and even closing their doors because they can’t staff their business.
Liz Rammer, the President and CEO at Hospitality Minnesota, told the WCCO Morning News Wednesday that this is a major problem across the state.
“It's a statewide issue from corner to corner,” Rammer tells John Hines. “In small communities, as well as our larger dense metro areas. What's happening is folks having to close for certain day parts when they normally would be open for breakfast or lunch, for example, because they do not have staff. In greater Minnesota this is an even bigger problem because when you look at some of these places, typically in the resort campground, lodging, restaurant areas, in the summertime this is their Christmas. This is when they make the money to get them through the lean winter months. So it's a huge challenge and all the owners are working as quickly and fast as they can to fill in the gaps.”
There have been critics of the added unemployment bonus workers who are on unemployment are receiving. They get an extra $300 per week through the federal American Rescue Plan passed earlier this year. Rammer dismisses that notion, saying it is a very small concern compared to the actual number of jobs still open. She says most just moved on from the industry.
“This industry is still down 40,000 jobs,” Rammer explains. “And so while that may help bring some back, we know that, in the case of restaurants, they were closed for 249 days. During that time, people had to make choices about how they could make a living and many left the industry. That on top of the fact that we just were short of people before even COVID hit, we're wondering how this will impact and how much we'll see come back to the workforce. It remains to be seen.”
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Rammer adds that many workers are still having challenges with childcare and caring for elders that are also impacting their choices of where and how they can work.
There are also many establishments offering significant incentives to new hires, something Rammer says will have to continue in a very competitive job market.
“This is across the board, beyond hospitality,” Rammer said. “Certainly we've seen all of those different creative solutions to try to find work and workers, and it’s really been challenging. They're looking at increased wages, incentives, bonuses, for staying, 60, 90 days. All the different components related to benefits as well. So yes, there's all those things at play as workers are in high demand across the board.
Rammer also says PPP Loans issued by the government has had a very positive impact in keeping these businesses afloat.
“We've heard from many of our members saying that if they didn't have that, they would be toast,” Rammer tells WCCO. “And same thing is true on the restaurant revitalization fund, which we're asking Congress to replenish because in this state, we have $700 million worth of unmet needs. So we had over 4,000 applicants for that fund and only 1,700 got funded. So it's a huge gap and these restaurants are really looking for help as they are digging out of a crushing debt load from the last year and all the shutdowns.”