Ashley Webster of FOX Business explains why some companies are facing the challenge of filling vacancies.
The owner of seafood Restaurants on Cape Cod has suspended lunch service and has delayed the opening of some locations due to its summer influx of Guest workers has not yet arrived.
More than a thousand miles away, a Jamaican couple worries whether the rest of their extended family can join them for the seasonal migration to the popular beach destination south of Boston that has been a vital lifeline for them for decades.
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With vaccinated Americans traveling in comfort again, popular summer destinations await a busy season. However, hotel, restaurant and retail store owners are warning that staff shortages exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic could force them to limit occupancy, cut working hours and services, or close facilities altogether once they move from a dismal year recover.
The problem is twofold: The annual influx of foreign seasonal workers has stalled in places due to the pandemic. Companies have also struggled to attract US workers, though many have redoubled efforts to recruit new employees amid high local unemployment.
“It is the Hunger Games for these employers who are battling to bring these migrant workers into the country while doing everything possible to recruit them domestically,” said Brian Crawford, executive vice president of the American Hotel and Lodging Association Washington. DC-based industrial group. “It’s really frustrating. They’re trying to get back on their feet after this catastrophic pandemic, but they just can’t take a break.”
Earlier this month, President Joe Biden phased out a controversial ban on temporary work visas such as the J-1 program for students and the H-2B program for non-agricultural workers imposed by former President Donald Trump.
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But American embassies and consulates remain closed or severely understaffed in many countries. The US has too imposed restrictions to travelers from countries such as the UK, Ireland, Brazil and South Africa due to the emergence of new virus variants or rising COVID-19 cases.
Provincetown, Massachusetts bartender Denis Angelov left the hotel and served his guests at the Tin Pan Alley restaurant in Provincetown on Tuesday, April 6, 2021. (AP Photo / Steven Senne)
Proponents of the J-1 program, in which approximately 300,000 foreign students attend annually, urged the State Department a letter Thursday to exempt applicants from travel bans and to grant other facilities so that they can start their summer jobs. Ilir Zherka, head of the Alliance for International Exchange, who sent the letter along with more than 500 supporting groups and companies, argued that the J-1 program not only benefits the local economy, but also helps strengthen national security, by promoting understanding and appreciation of US culture.
Proponents of the H-2B program have meanwhile again called for the program, which is limited to 66,000 visas per fiscal year, to be revised. Citing summer demand from employers, the Biden government said Tuesday it would approve an additional 22,000 H-2B visas, but lawmakers from New England and other regions who are on visas for tourism, landscaping, forestry, fish processing and other seasonal business are on visas are instructed to say that this is still insufficient.
“This is infinitesimal. It is nowhere near necessary,” said Congressman Bill Keating, a Democrat who represents Cape Cod.
Cem Küçükgenç (Gem Koo-CHOOK-gench), a 22-year-old engineering student at the Middle East Technical University in Turkey, is among thousands of overseas students around the world awaiting J-1 visa approval.
He is scheduled to work at a waterfront restaurant in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin this summer, but the U.S. embassy in Ankara recently announced that it cannot process temporary work visas in time for the summer season.
Turkey has imposed a partial lockdown as the coronavirus rises there, but Küçükgenç still hopes the message could give way as virus cases subside.
“I’m going to graduate next year,” he said. “I’m not sure when I have another chance.”
Freda Powell says she and her husband secured their H-2B visas in Jamaica and will arrive in Cape Cod in early May, where they have been working in retail stores and restaurants for about 20 summers.
But the 55-year-old worries that her siblings and other relatives might not be so lucky. The U.S. Embassy in Kingston has temporarily stopped processing visas as COVID-19 cases have increased in their country.
“You can work in Jamaica, but it’s hand in mouth,” Powell said. “The money you make in the US can be used to buy a car, fix the house, send your kids to school, and build savings.”
Uncertainty about international hiring has forced American companies to redouble their domestic hiring efforts or make tough compromises until reinforcements can arrive.
In the White Mountains of New Hampshire is the Christmas theme park Santa’s Village very promising College students free housing and supplies.
In California’s Sonoma Valley, executives in the famous wine region are investigating the idea of pooling employees, among other things.
Mark Bodenhamer, director of the Sonoma Valley Chamber of Commerce, said a restaurant that serves breakfast and lunch could potentially share staff with one who does most of its business in the evenings.
“These solutions are complicated and costly,” he said. “But at this point all hands are on deck.”
The tourist season is already well underway in North Carolina’s Outer Banks, but there is a major shortage of staff, according to Karen Brown, director of the Beach Area Chamber of Commerce.
Some restaurants have had to close or shut down once a week, while in some hotels managers help maids hand over the rooms, she said.
“Everyone tunes in where they can just to keep the wheels on the bus,” Brown said.
Mac Hay, who owns seafood restaurants and markets on Cape Cod, is one of the business owners who doubts that extra efforts to hire American workers will pay off.
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In any given year, he estimates that around a third of his 350 employees will ultimately have to come from seasonal visa workers from Mexico, Jamaica and other countries in the summer if the vacancies are not filled.
Hay argues that the overseas workers are the “backbone of the kitchen staff” – the line chefs, food prep workers, and dishwashers – that enable him to hire Americans for jobs they are looking for, such as working in the kitchen. B. Waiting tables, bartenders and management.
“Without an increased workforce, we simply cannot meet demand,” he said.
Entrepreneurs and experts say there are myriad reasons US citizens are not reacting quickly to the job boom, from worries about COVID-19 to problems with childcare or simply the decision to receive unemployment benefits that are increasing and expanding became the summer season in most places.
The need for international workers on Cape Cod – where rising housing costs have been a major barrier to creating a sizeable native workforce – boils down to a simple math problem, Hay said.
Provincetown, a popular gay resort community at the tip of the Cape, has a year-round population of just 2,200, but restaurants like Hay’s employ around 2,000 workers in high season alone.
“We’re at a dead end up here,” he said. “Nobody else is coming.”
