Six months into the COVID-19 pandemic, the restaurant industry continues to be one of the hardest hit businesses, and its employees continue to suffer its effects.
According to 2020 National Restaurant Association data, prior to the pandemic, restaurants were projected to employ 15.6 million people this year.
In April, weeks into the mandatory closures of restaurants and bars across the state, California unemployment rose to a record 15.5%, a number that has somewhat stabilized as restaurants and bars have attempted to reopen under limited state-mandated conditions. The leisure and hospitality industry was reportedly hit the hardest, posting the largest job loss of 866,200 jobs lost in April according to California Employment Development Department data.
Patrick Ryan, an Orange County bartender, has still been unable to return to work after months of unemployment following California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s March 16 announcement shutting down bars and restaurants across the state.
Ryan formerly worked at the OC Brewhouse, a restaurant inside of the Hyatt Regency Orange County. “The hotel was closed for all of April, all of May, and all of June. They opened back up in July, but not for food and beverage, only for people to stay.” He also mentioned that during the first month of closure, the hotel would update the staff about what may happen next but he has not heard anything else since then.
Since the OC Brewhouse’s closing, he has received unemployment benefits and has been seeking out another source of work but said he feels it is very tough in the current climate.
“The thing with your unemployment is that your work pays into that, so if they call you to come back in, you have to. You don’t have a choice, because if you say no they will cut your unemployment off,” Ryan said.
When asked if the payments received from unemployment was similar to his usual work pay, Ryan said, “Much less. With unemployment, the maximum amount you can qualify for is $450 a week. For a while, they had the extra $600 a week they were giving people, so that put it close to the amount,” referring to the federal CARES Act that extended unemployment benefits but ended July 25.
Since the closing of Ryan’s bar, he has now been looking for work in alcohol sales and distribution rather than bartending jobs. When asked if it is strange applying to different jobs, he said, “Oh yeah, totally. I considered looking into it while I was still working at my old job, but working in food and beverage like that, especially in a bar that is so busy, it was hard to transition into a job and start from the bottom and not make the same amount of money, because it would have been a big pay cut.”
“I’ve been tending bars for like 7 years and I was always confident that when times were good, people drink, and when times are bad, people drink. I never considered a virus would go around and make it so you couldn’t go out,” said Ryan.
Like Ryan, Aisha Oliver, a former Long Beach-based waitress, also decided to change paths due to the pandemic.
Oliver previously worked at The Ordinarie, a restaurant located in downtown Long Beach, but chose not to return following the June reopening. She has temporarily relocated to Miami, Florida and has begun school.
Occurring to Oliver, prior to the pandemic and subsequent shutdown, “All the servers made a decent income and it was very livable especially for the L.A. area. Around February when rumors of COVID started to circulate, it was a pretty substantial kind of business, and we just kinda closed down.”
Regarding how restaurants have been coping with the pandemic, Oliver said, “I think they are doing the best they can. They are businesses that are trying to keep afloat, but the restaurant I worked at was fairly new.”
Despite the many safety precautions restaurants have taken to follow protocols and ensure their guests’ safety, such as only allowing a maximum of six people to a table and spacing tables six feet apart, Oliver said she questions restaurants’ safety.
“Given the nature of the food industry, I don’t really see it as safe, because people do have to remove their masks to eat. It’s not the customers’ fault or the restaurant’s, it’s the nature of things that makes it very difficult to regulate. So I would consider it to be a very risky environment to go,” Oliver said.
On her decision not to return to the hospitality industry, Oliver said,“I think I would have gone back, but the money isn’t there anymore and tips are just not the same, and we are depending on tips.”
For those still working amid the partial reopening, such as Long Beach bartender Justin Ahn, conditions have been difficult to manage. Between working solely outside throughout heat waves and poor air quality, many restaurant workers have found it difficult to endure.
Along with wearing the required masks and face shields, many servers and bartenders have also seen a significant drop in income due to many factors such as limited seating capacity.
“Initially, when food service resumed operations the first time around I was reluctant to return,” Ahn said. “But since I see it as my career, I knew I had to plan ahead and make steps to advance so I went back to my two jobs and picked up a third one as insurance, cause no one can really know how long this would last for. ‘This’ being the reduction in income as a result of the overall reduction in restaurant traffic.”
Ahn bartends at three restaurants in Long Beach, the Mezcalero, Playa Amor, and The Ordinarie. He has noticed a difference in income, but explained that it depends on specific business models.
“Some jobs have cut labor significantly to make up for huge losses in income. So some people have been making more than they have before, but at the cost of others losing jobs. And other businesses, even with a reduction in labor, are still struggling because they might not have as much available outdoor seating, or even the potential to expand.”
Ahn said that with labor cutting efforts, more is expected of bartenders including aspects of serving as well.
“I definitely miss the social aspect of communicating with guests and not having physical boundaries like hugging and shaking hands,” said Ahn, who has been working in the service industry for five years.
“Most people who work probably feel safe because most people in the industry are young and healthy and aren’t susceptible to the worst of the disease,” he said.
“But personally, I worry. I know I’ll survive. But I don’t want to unknowingly get it and pass it off to people I care about who are more likely to die from it. Safety is not a guarantee, but if everyone puts in an effort, it will slow the spread.”
Despite potential safety risks both to employees and customers, Ahn does not foresee restaurants closing their doors once again.
“With the devastating effect on the economy so far, I don’t think we really can afford to just stop businesses again. Only to try our best to survive.”
When asked what he misses most of pre-pandemic restaurant life, Ahn simply said “The normalcy. Everything seems weird. But eventually, this will become normal anyways.”