Will the job market ever be the same again?

[turbinetree]

By Associated Press -March 13, 2021 1:00 PM

Demand for waiters, cashiers, front-desk clerks, and ticket takers may never regain its previous highs.

Esther Montanez's housecleaning job at the Hilton Back Bay in Boston was a lifeline for her, a 31-year-old single mother with a 5-year-old son.

The pay was steady and solid — enough to pay her bills and still have money left over to sock away for a savings account for her child. Montanez liked her co-workers and felt pride in her work.

But when the viral pandemic slammed violently into the U.S. economy a year ago, igniting a devastating recession, it swept away her job, along with many tens of millions of others. Since then, in desperation, Montanez has siphoned away money from her son's savings to help meet expenses. At Christmas, she turned to charities to provide presents for him. For now, she's getting by on unemployment aid and, for the first time, has applied for food stamps.

https://americanindependent.com/coronavirus-pandemic-covid-unemployment-job-market-permanent-losses/

[Hoyt]

1. Guess we didn't realize how good those jobs really were at the time.

Hope those jobs return and/or people get training for better jobs.

By “good jobs,” I don’t mean something to aspire to or to be stuck in forever, but as one lady said, the jobs were readily available and good enough to pay bills and have some money left over.

[turbinetree]

3. I remember in the 80's, when the interest rates went thru the roof and working construction

as a Union carpenter, couldn't buy a job, was sitting at home and saw an advertisement for being a aircraft technician, always loved planes, grew up around them, and went and took out a $5,000 government loan to get trained, and worked in that industry for over 25+years, got a degree, went to work in a engineering facility, and because of that experience became a liaison for the shop floor building of aircraft, and in the present moment I don't see that industry coming back until next year at the earliest ,,,,I was lucky, and I hope that when this thing gets under control everyone in that article and those that are not mentioned can fulfill their dream, they are not asking for to much, they really are not..............

[roamer65]

4. Some will come back.

But it will be a few years before they do.

[Chainfire]

5. We have seen that there are different ways of doing a lot of things.

So yes, there will be permanent changes. The most positive thing to come out of this could be the ability for so many people to work from home. That saves a lot of resources.

I lived through the good times and bad time in the construction industry as well as the above poster. Even with the downturns, over the period of my working life, I did as well financially as my wife who had a master's degree. I did spend most of my construction career inside of the office after about 6 years of working with my tools. I didn't want to be turning wrenches into my golden years.

[Yavin4]

7. I don't think that working from home will be as big as people speculate that it will be.

The higher paying, better careers involve personal meetings and physical interactions. It's hard to duplicate that over zoom.

[Yavin4]

6. I see the opposite. We will see a huge economic expansion in the 2nd half of the year and into 2022.

The relief money that's going out along with the vaccines will unleash a surge in consumer activity for the 2nd half of this year and into Christmas. We will see spending to make up for missed events from 2020. Think proms, weddings, graduations, etc.

Already there's an uptick in airline travel not seen since before the pandemic.

[Laelth]

8. Excellent essay. k&r n/t

-Laelth