Here & Now

State Lawmakers Who Own Restaurants Confront Workforce Woes

Frederica Freyberg:

On the economic front, Pew Research says nearly 10 million Americans lost their jobs at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. And while many of those jobs have returned, the workers have not. “Here & Now” senior political reporter Zac Schultz shows us what’s happening in the restaurant industry and why both Republicans and Democrats blame the government’s response but for different reasons.

Zac Schultz:

Anywhere you travel in Wisconsin, you’ll find “Now Hiring” signs hanging in the windows of restaurants or displayed on a sign or even listed on the board next to the daily special.

Rob Swearingen:

I’ve got an ad in the paper that is reoccurring every time the paper is published. I’m looking for a cook and wait staff.

Zac Schultz:

Rob Swearingen and his wife own the Al-Gen Dinner Club in Rhinelander.

Rob Swearingen:

How long you been in the bar business?

Man:

Five years.

Rob Swearingen:

Oh, congratulations. Five years?

Zac Schultz:

He’s also a Republican representative in the State Assembly.

Rob Swearingen:

Did you have any problems getting help this year?

Man:

No. I’ve got a lot of family.

Rob Swearingen:

Family help. Okay.

Zac Schultz:

He says the problem started on St. Patrick’s Day of 2020.

Rob Swearingen:

We had the corn beef in the oven.

Zac Schultz:

That’s when Governor Tony Evers issued the first “Safer At Home” order and shut down most of the state in an effort to stop the spread of the coronavirus.

Rob Swearingen:

We had reservations and we were ready to go and the light switch went off and it stayed off for a long time.

Zac Schultz:

The shutdown meant laying off bartenders and wait staff. When they were allowed to open up in a limited capacity, Swearingen found many employees weren’t coming back.

Rob Swearingen:

It’s been a struggle since then to try to bring the staff up to where we were pre-COVID.

Kristine Hillmer:

There is not a sector that I know that isn’t scrambling for staff.

Zac Schultz:

Kristine Hillmer is president and CEO of the Wisconsin Restaurant Association. She says a lot of workers found jobs outside the hospitality industry.

Kristine Hillmer:

We – statewide – lost about 22% of our workforce. They went to other industries that were still hiring during the pandemic, specifically health care, manufacturing, retail. So a lot of those folks are no longer available to come back and work.

Francesca Hong:

It’s important to remember that we had a people shortage and a labor shortage in this state prior to the pandemic.

Zac Schultz:

Francesca Hong is co-owner at Morris Ramen, a noodle shop in Madison. She says the reasons for the worker shortage go beyond people switching careers. She says government has not enacted policies that would help people get back in the workforce.

Francesca Hong:

If there was universal health care, if there was paid sick leave, if there was affordable and accessible, high-quality child care, we wouldn’t be losing so many women in this industry.

Zac Schultz:

When Hong’s restaurant closed down, she decided to run for the Assembly as a Democrat.

Francesca Hong:

And we needed a really strong working class voice who not only understood the needs of service industry workers, but those in communities that have always been marginalized.

Zac Schultz:

There are a number of restaurant and bar owners in the Legislature.

Waitress:

You need a menu?

Zac Schultz:

But like Swearingen, most of them are Republicans. They focused on one thing for causing the worker shortage: the extra $300 a week in unemployment benefits provided by the federal government to help workers displaced by the pandemic.

Rob Swearingen:

The only incentive that some of these people had to get off the couch was to go to the mailbox once a week.

Zac Schultz:

Governor Evers didn’t need legislative approval to accept the extra benefits and he vetoed a Republican bill that would have ended the program during the summer. Republican Representative Michael Schraa was convinced it was the extra $300 keeping people from working at his custard shop.

Michael Schraa:

I’ll pay you $20 an hour. I’ll put you up for the week. I’m ten employees short.

Zac Schultz:

During an attempt to override the veto, he said Representative Hong should support ending the benefits.

Michael Schraa:

I know the gentlelady from the 76th when we were on the floor a couple weeks ago, she actually confessed to me that she had to bus tables because she did not have enough workers.

Francesca Hong:

I didn’t confess sh_t to you.

Zac Schultz:

Her response got her mic got off for a moment.

Francesca Hong:

It’s not a surprise the gentleman from the 53rd is struggling to retain workers. I certainly wouldn’t want to work for you. It is an honor to bus tables. Do you know how many people are actually on pandemic UI right now? 17,459 out of 3.1 million people in the Wisconsin workforce. That’s who you’re going after? This is political theater.

Clerk:

59 ayes, 37 nos. Assembly Bill 336 is not passed.

Zac Schultz:

Governor Evers’ veto was upheld. Representative Hong has no regrets about that day.

Francesca Hong:

So if anyone should be attacking work ethic, it’s the work ethic of my Republican colleagues.

Zac Schultz:

A study by the Wall Street Journal showed states that ended the benefits early saw about the same job growth rate over the summer as states that did not. The extra $300 a week in federal benefits ended in early September.

Rob Swearingen:

Have I had an increase in applications? No. One or two.

Zac Schultz:

The Wisconsin Restaurant Association supported the move to end the benefits early.

Kristine Hillmer:

Do I think that the federal unemployment dollars had an impact on restaurant workers and so on? Absolutely. I think it was a factor out of many factors. Is the elimination of it going to completely take away the trend that we can’t find workers? Absolutely not.

Zac Schultz:

Hillmer says bigger factors include baby boomers retiring and not taking a part-time job and the number of teenagers who don’t have time for work. And of course we’re still in the middle of a pandemic.

Kristine Hillmer:

We know that there’s a lot of folks that are concerned about COVID and returning to work.

Zac Schultz:

All of this has led to changes in the industry. First, you need to keep the employees you do have.

Rob Swearingen:

One of my employees came in late tonight. I had some stern words with him. Get back to work because I have nobody to replace him.

Francesca Hong:

I think the restaurant community is inherently about caring for one another and those are the most successful restaurants are the restaurants that take care of their staff because that will allow the staff to take care of their customers.

Zac Schultz:

Reporting from Rhinelander, I’m Zac Schultz for “Here & Now.”