Changed workers
ford child care.
“Something just kind of broke, where I thought about how hard I was working for this job that paid about $32,000 a year,” Weitzel said.
Weitzel, 31, got accepted to Rung for Women, a St. Louis program that offers career coaching and training for jobs in high demand, including banking, health care, customer service and technology. In the fall, when her oldest daughter starts preschool, Weitzel hopes to get part-time work in a new career.
Mark Smithivas drove for Uber and Lyft for four years before he abruptly quit last spring out of concern for his health. He has spent the last year taking technology classes in a federal worker training program.
Smithivas, 52, just got his second vaccination, but he doesn’t want to go back to ride-hailing. He worries about carjackings and other crimes targeting drivers in Chicago, where he lives.
“I always viewed this job as temporary, and I really do want to find something that fits my career and background better,” he said.
Some workers say the pandemic helped them prioritize their mental and physical health.
After a lifelong career as a bartender, 57-year-old Ellen Booth was in constant pain from lifting ice buckets and beer kegs. But without a college degree, she felt she had limited options.
When the restaurant she worked for closed last year, she said it gave her “the kick I needed.” Booth, of Coventry, Rhode Island, started a year-long class to learn to be a medical coder. When her unemployment benefits ran out two months ago, she started drawing on her retirement funds.
Shelly Ortiz, 25, used to love her career as a restaurant server. But things changed last June, when her Phoenix restaurant reopened its dining room. She wore two masks and glasses to protect herself, but still felt anxiety in a restaurant full of unmasked diners.
Sexual harassment also got worse, she said. Patrons would ask her to pull down her mask so they could see how cute she was before tipping her.
Ortiz quit in July after she learned that the restaurant didn’t deep-clean the bar after a bartender was potentially exposed. She and her partner, a teacher, curtailed their spending, and Ortiz returned to school full time. This month, she is graduating from Glendale Community College with a degree in film and a certificate in documentary directing.
Ortiz stopped getting unemployment benefits in November, when she did some part-time film work. Money is tight, she said,
but she’s never been happier. And she doesn’t think she’ll ever be a restaurant server again.
“I don’t know if I could do it with a smile anymore,” she said. “I don’t think it should be an option for anyone to treat any worker the way that service industry workers are treated in America.”
In a tight labor market,
some workers are also finding that if they hold out, they might get a better job than the one they left.
Taryn Henderson spent six years working at Best Buy before she was unexpectedly let go in February.
“They didn’t value the work I put in, the time I put in, because I got laid off,” said Henderson, 24, a college student who lives in Austin, Texas. “It was just really discouraging.”
At first she focused on her schoolwork, living on her unemployment checks and a severance payment that gave her 10 weeks’ worth of pay. But soon she was anxious to work again, and thought a new job that valued her more would make her feel better.
After a few months of searching, she found another job with a music streaming service. She’ll start later this month and will make $10 more per hour than the $17 she made at Best Buy.
“As long as I’m making enough money that I can support myself, the people that I love and I can get to travel every once in a while, I’m good,” said Henderson. “I think this job will afford me the opportunities to do that.”