Jobs are hard to find in South Florida — but so are workers. What gives?
The state of the South Florida jobs market in December 2020? Confusing.
On the one hand, about 119,000 individuals remained out of work in October in Miami-Dade County, according to the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity. That’s down from the approximately 176,000 unemployed in September. In Broward, 74,000 were out of work in October, compared with 80,000 the month prior.
On the other hand, interviews with local hiring managers and staffing experts suggest many establishments are struggling to find not just qualified job applicants, but any applicants at all.
It appears that thanks to continued unemployment assistance — however meager — and the ongoing fear of being infected with the coronavirus, many jobs that should seemingly be getting snapped up remain unfilled.
“A lot of workers are continuing to stay home,” said Ann Machado, founder and CEO of Creative Staffing. “So many employers can’t fill roles, because workers are getting unemployment, and/or they’re afraid to go to work.”
It adds up to a muddied picture of exactly how out-of-work South Floridians are responding to being jobless.
Who’s hiring?
State data show there are two consistent bright spots in the local hiring landscape: logistics and manufacturing. In the Miami-Miami Beach-Kendall metro area, the sector comprising trade, transportation, and utilities added 4,000 jobs in October, state data show. Manufacturing added 1,200. Companies like DHL, FedEx, UPS, Walmart, Titan Cement, and defense giant Raytheon — which has a facility in Opa-locka — have all hired or are currently hiring for technical and supply-chain positions like inspectors, machinists, forklift operators, package handlers and drivers.
Yet these specialized sectors continue to comprise a fraction of a local labor force dominated by hospitality and tourism workers. Despite Miami-Dade’s net job gains, the county’s overall labor force, which includes those employed and those looking for work, shrank by nearly 54,000 in October, suggesting many of those who had been seeking jobs in September stopped doing so a month later.
One possible reason for the drop-off: The types of jobs available. On jobs site Indeed.com, the greatest number of new postings in November for the South Florida area were for contract work with commission-based national mortgage brokerage Madison Allied LLC; hourly shift roles, some of them part-time and starting at $9 an hour, at Taco Bell, Burger King, and AutoZone; and the University of Miami, which actually has a hiring freeze but continues to advertise for many medical roles and other essential positions related to COVID-19 responses.
“The job numbers we’re seeing each month are usually just people going back to the jobs they lost,” said Ned Murray, associate director of the Jorge M. Pérez Metropolitan Center at Florida International University. “And many times, they’re only going back on a temporary basis.”
Gains in two other sectors where the Miami area has traditionally showed strength — healthcare and construction — have been uneven. While state data show healthcare and education services added 1,800 jobs in October, they were mostly concentrated in ambulatory healthcare services, like at-home care. Data from Indeed confirm senior- and elder-care provider Right At Home is among those with a large share of job postings.
Meanwhile, Miami-Dade hospitals shed another 100 net jobs in October, state data show.
Darline Candio, president and CEO of Miami-based Emergent Healthcare Consulting Services, said morale continues to plummet among healthcare workers amid the pandemic, with many choosing early retirement or quitting — though this has increased job postings for registered nurses.
“From the feedback I’m getting, they are not getting adequate support from the systems they’re working in,” Candio said.
Restaurant snapshot
Most job losses in the area’s hospitality sector are now concentrated among hotels; state data show accommodation establishments lost another 300 workers in October.
The restaurant world may be a better indicator of the state of the local jobs market. State data show that in the Miami-Miami Beach-Kendall metro area, restaurant hiring is up, with food service and drinking establishments adding 3,700 jobs in October — a 4.6% increase from September.
However, many restaurant workers remain short of their usual volume of shifts. That’s true for Richard Vona, 47, a longtime waiter at the Fleming’s Prime Steakhouse and Wine Bar location in Coral Gables. Vona said that with the expiration of $600 unemployment benefits, he had no choice but to go back to work when the restaurant reopened in August. But he’s now only making half the $1,000 a week he used to prior to the pandemic.
He said most of his coworkers have also returned. Weekdays remain slow, he said, but weekends are picking up.
“Everyone’s come back, but there’s just not enough work for everyone,” Vona said.
While numerous restaurants have shuttered during the pandemic, new ones have been opening. Among them is Cerveceria La Tropical, a brewery and dining space owned by Lagunitas Brewing Company that was slated to open in May but is now aiming for January.
Tropical food and beverage manager Delius Shirley — previously owner of Ortanique On The Mile in Coral Gables, which closed earlier this year — said the response to a job fair notice posted this week has been “overwhelming.” He believes some of that interest is likely due to Tropical’s notoriety and corporate backing, and the fact that its space, a former warehouse, is better suited to the pandemic and post-pandemic world.
Red Rooster Overtown, the new concept from famed New York chef Marcus Samuelsson, continues to hire for numerous positions as it opens this month. Like Shirley, Derek Fleming, managing partner of Samuelsson’s corporation, said he has also been getting a flurry of applicants. But Fleming said some may be coming from more modest dining establishments and are proving unable to meet Rooster’s strict training requirements.
Still others are proving unwilling to abide by Red Rooster’s strict COVID-19 requirements.
“The pool is not as large as it could be,” Fleming said. “It’s not easy. There’s a lot of sifting.”
No applicants
And that seems to be the rub: Despite many workers struggling to find steady work, there appears to also be a substantial number of employers who can’t fill roles.
That’s the case even among positions with seemingly plum salaries. Flanigan’s Seafood Bar and Grill owner Jimmy Flanigan said he has beefed up pay for a line cook to $15 an hour for full-time gigs that also come with health insurance, paid vacation and a 401K program.
No luck.
“It’s shocking to me,” he said. “I’ve had to enlist everything I can think of to get applicants in the door...We’re offering pretty darn good money.”
Front-of-house roles, like servers, are proving equally tricky.
“And we’re doing well compared to our competitors, so if you’re going to be a waiter, it’s a good opportunity,” he said.
Flanigan said he was not certain whether fear of COVID-19 was affecting hiring.
“That’s the $64,000 question,” he said.
Tiffany Price, general manager at Job Post Media, which hosts career fairs as well as a jobs board, said a wave of job seekers that began searching when $600 in additional federal unemployment assistance expired July 31 has long subsided.
“People are still afraid,” she said. “If you need money, you need a job, but we’re seeing fewer applications for any job — whether it’s retail, sales, or anything commission based. They’re struggling (to find workers).”
Hair salons are also among those struggling to fill stylist positions. Vinny Morris, owner of Salon Euphoria in Davie, said many of his stylists are now working out of their own or clients’ homes — or so-called salon “suites” where individual chairs are available to rent. He believes these stylists are choosing to take cash and make their own hours.
“Our phone rings off the hook, but I don’t have any stylists to book these people with,” Morris said.
Any worker currently receiving state unemployment will have likely found other ways to earn money on the side or receive support from elsewhere: Florida benefits remained capped at $275 per week.
One booming job category: food delivery. An Uber spokesman said more than 25,000 South Florida residents have joined its food or grocery delivery platforms since March 15. And half a million individuals have joined Instacart since the outset of the pandemic; local figures were not immediately available.
