Skilled Workers Struggle with Post-Pandemic Stress
Date Posted: October 4, 2022
Posted In: COVID-19 Updates, Discussion, Workforce,
From ACHR News: Working in the trades already comes with its fair share of stress, but for the last couple years, the industry has also had to deal with COVID-19, supply chain issues, the material shortage, rising gas prices, and much more. Levi Torres, owner of High 5 Plumbing, said the labor shortage has been one of his biggest stressors.
“I wouldn’t say it’s so much the shortage in technicians, but more a labor shortage in entry-level positions, like warehouses and call centers,” noted Torres.
He said, for the most part, skilled plumbers and technicians still want to be working those jobs before and after the pandemic. On the other hand, he noticed that those who were in entry-level positions outside of skilled labor were more likely to have opted for a career change during the pandemic.
Torres also noticed a change in attitude in the younger generation over the last few years. He said many newer skilled workers come into the field expecting to have the same treatment as more seasoned employees, which is difficult to accommodate because no matter how well a new plumber or technician is doing, they still have to rely on the experience of those other employees in order to succeed.
“It causes stress because entry-level people feel like maybe they’re not treated as fair and that’s been one of the biggest challenges of getting people into the industry and then getting them to commit to staying in it,” explained Torres.
He added that this issue is a “slippery slope” because the skilled trades do have a stigma of hazing, which makes it difficult to determine whether or not someone has legitimately been mistreated. He said the industry used to have the expectation that if someone got hurt, they were supposed to tough it out, or if they had problems, they weren’t supposed to talk about it.
He also explained that a lot of the time, many of those in the trades are “worked to death” simply because the companies they work for undervalue their knowledge of the industry. When a company doesn’t charge enough for their services, Torres said it makes it difficult for them to properly take care of their employees.