Monday's Afternoon Update
| 5/10/2021
Florida's hospitality industry: Employers need workers. Workers need jobs. What's the problem?
Evans Philias of Hollywood is eager to get back to work. He was furloughed in March 2020 after seven years with Starbucks at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. Matthew Slaine, the CEO of Quality Restaurant Group, has the opposite problem. QRG owns more than 350 Pizza Huts, Sonic Drive-Ins, Arby's and Moe’s Southwest Grills that need workers just like Philias. In fact, the company needs almost 1,500 of them in Florida alone.Despite a high demand for workers, and the fact that Florida's unemployment rate in the hospitality industry is still 24% above pre-pandemic lows, employers and employees cannot seem to come together. More from the Palm Beach Post.