I will say that I’ve personally worked 3 service jobs all at once and still couldn’t afford a roof over my head. I also now live in a town where kids dropping out of high school can make 100k+ a year valeting cars/hauling drinks/taking off their clothes.
I also will say that I agree that my poor wages weren’t the responsibility of anyone else to cover. It wasn’t enough, so I changed fields and was phenomenally happier pushing dirt in my tractor where no one was grabbing my arse.
A few days ago I read that my town is having a crazy shortage of minimum wage restaurant staff. Servers and crew. To where the place up the street is now offering a $750 sign on bonus to make up for crappy wages.
Since the reset, people have been reevaluating their lives and instead of working for tips, they are choosing to instead work for distribution giants popping up all over town. The service industry will have to adjust if they want to survive. No staff means longer waits which means pissed off customers who will go somewhere else.
Just had a call this morning with a portfolio manager that was speaking to this topic. You see all of the hospitality industries scrambling right now to try to fill in for employee shortages. One of the convenience stores I noticed was offering a $500 signing bonus and then free subs everyday to attract new hires. And some of the hotels are offering $23/hr for what was a $15/hr position. The scary part is that I believe we will see money spent in the short term to fill positions and then you will see a kiosk put in and bring those costs back down for employers. Scary time for some of the service industries out there. Especially come September on this year.
The local news here has been interviewing restaurant owners that are upset b/c no one wants their job back. A one time bonus isn’t enough. I hope those that are not returning to wait tables found better jobs, with better pay and benefits.
I’m in Southern California. California does not have tipped minimum wage here so restaruant servers make at least the prevailing minimum wage, plus tips. We’ve been raising the minimum wage here every year such that next year we’ll be at $15/hr. Restaurants are still thriving here but what some of them have done (and I’ve noticed this in ones that are ALWAYS busy so it’s not like they have to) is add a “service charge”, typically 3 or 4%, to your bill to cover “increased wages and benefits”. So instead of, say, raising the prices on their items like 25 cents or 50 cents or whatever, they do this sneaky service charge nonsense and there’s no proof it even goes to worker benefits/wages (my guess is that it doesn’t). So annoying. But, I can tell you that raising the minimum wage won’t kill restaurants, they just have to pay a decent wage comparable to their competition and if they can’t, oh well.
Also, here the shortage doesn’t seem to be so much with FOH but with getting cooks. Right now would be an excellent time to be a cook, I think. Especially in an area like Orlando.