Maria Simonetti sat at a table in her familyâs new Punta Gorda pizzeria, cradling her cell phone in one hand, massaging her rotator cuff with the other.
âIâm on hold. Iâve been trying to get an appointment for my shoulder,â she explained. âItâs just the three of us working right now. We had somebody apply to do dishes for $15 an hour, but they said, âIt has to be on my terms, on days I want to work.ââ
Sal, Maria and Lucia Simonetti are running Santa Lucia Pizzeria in Punta Gorda by themselves for now. SUN PHOTO BY SUE WADE
Southwest Florida continues to add jobs to the ones lost as a side effect of the COVID-19 global pandemic.
The five-county region of Charlotte, Collier, Glades, Hendry and Lee counties has added 473,700 jobs from a year ago. That means the jobs lost number has fallen from almost half a million to 23,000, according to the January employment report released Monday by Florida’s Department of Economic Opportunity.
Southwest Florida construction jobs climbed by 1,900 from a year ago, according to the data analyzed from the state report by CareerSource Southwest Florida.
“Looking at the numbers, we have reached what we consider full employment, which is between 4 and 5%,” said Janeth Castrejon, communications manager for CareerSource Southwest Florida. “We are kind of leading the way on this number. What’s the best indicator is the year-to-year comparison instead of month-to-month.
FGCU study shows SWFL housing market still benefiting during pandemic
Published: February 1, 2021 10:58 PM EST
Updated: February 1, 2021 11:11 PM EST
Recommended
According to a new report from FGCU, Southwest Florida’s economy has a promising side effect from the pandemic.
It says single-family home building permits went up 39%. Home sales up 37% and home prices up 13 to 30%.
An economic expert says, thanks to low interest rates during the pandemic, more people are upgrading or buying new homes, especially since more people need office space to work from home.
“One of the big things we’re seeing here is early retirees moving, plus people who could work from home remotely also making this move to Southwest Florida,” said Amir Neto, the interim director Regional Economic Research Institute in the Lutgert College of Business at FGCU.