Job growth beat expectations in several sectors, including leisure and hospitality, which added 42,000 jobs in the U.S. in May, up about 0.2% from the previous month, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The leisure and hospitality season is in full swing as more people travel and visit restaurants and bars this summer. That pleasure-seeking trend, along with wage increases across the country that were highlighted by Friday's numbers, is translating into job growth.
Restaurants and entertainment venues may be more expensive than they used to be, but we Americans like to splurge.
“The travel and tourism industry has bounced back very quickly post-COVID,” said Rich Khalil, director of the University of South Carolina's International Tourism Institute. “Though some things are still winding down, we're still seeing strong job growth in the U.S..”
“Restaurants, hotels and other leisure and hospitality industry operators will need to hire additional workers,” said Sean Snaith, director of the Economic Forecasting Institute at the University of Central Florida.
Though spending and employment are up, the leisure and hospitality industry looks a little different than it did before.
Hudson Riehle, senior vice president of research at the National Restaurant Association, said people are spending more on takeout and delivery.
But when it comes to table service, “the sector has more than 230,000 fewer positions than it had before the pandemic. So, overall, the industry's traffic patterns have changed dramatically as a result of the pandemic,” he said.
The restaurant industry is expected to hire more than 500,000 seasonal workers this summer, but those hires are also shifting, Leal said.
The age range of talent is expanding: “Young people aged 16 to 19 are significantly more likely to be employed in the industry than before the pandemic, as are people aged 60 and over,” he added.
These older workers could be a huge asset to an industry that's always hiring — perhaps they're buying summer jobs to supplement their income after retirement.
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