Summer Job Chase Gets Harder : Orange County Students Find Fewer Positions Because of Recession
Counting the days until summer vacation starts, students at Brea-Olinda High School who are hoping a job will fall into their laps may be in for a bit of a jolt.
Normally, the Orange County school’s job board is stocked with 25 to 30 notices from prospective employers this time of year.
This spring, however, there are only half as many job offers on the board. “We haven’t been getting a lot of calls from business people,” said Jim McWilliam, the school’s career guidance specialist. “I think it’s (due) to the economy, the recession. There’s not as much opportunity as there has been in the past.”
From inner-city shopping malls to suburban amusement parks, the jobs of summer will be harder to come by this year as the recession leaves Southern California youths with fewer openings and more competition.
With businesses cutting back on hiring and becoming more selective, students on summer break might have to take lower-paying or less desirable jobs, employment counselors say. Meanwhile, the recession finds older workers staying put at the low-paying, high-turnover, temporary or part-time jobs that normally would be filled by students in the summer.
“I’ve turned in five job applications in the past three weeks,” said Ahmad Abdulla, 19, of Anaheim, who prowled among the booths at a job fair in Norwalk last week. “I’ll go for any job I can find.”
Officials at First Break, a summer jobs program sponsored by the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce and the Los Angeles Unified School District, said it will be tough to come up with the 10,000 positions it usually finds for students.
“Every student who wants to work this summer can work,” said First Break coordinator Lynne Friedman. But, she added, “it’s going to be a little slower than last year, because more people are being more cautious. Students would be advised to be well prepared this summer.”
Friedman said employers might have cut back as a result of the school district’s new year-round schedule, which trims the traditional summer break to nine weeks from 12. “Until they get used to it, they will be a little leery of us,” she said.
Meanwhile, the waves of layoffs that have hit Southern California factories and offices--leaving more family breadwinners unemployed--mean that many students are under greater pressure to find work.
“Parents are getting laid off. So students have to find employment,” said Bernadette Graham, career adviser at Manual Arts High School in South Central Los Angeles. But jobs are in short supply at the inner-city fast-food outlets and mini-malls where most Manual Arts students find work, she said.
Layoffs and related cuts in family income mean that “there are more students than ever who are looking for work this summer,” said Joyce Waldren, director of the Ventura Youth Employment Service. Yet, “we won’t have the volume (of jobs) we did last year.”
The decline in jobs in Ventura shows that even suburban employers, whose summer jobs often went begging in years past, have cut back on hiring.
Dioana Chavez, a 17-year-old senior at San Gabriel High School, has spent the past month looking for a summer job in the San Gabriel Valley to help with the family finances.
She is still searching.
“It’s been hard,” said Chavez, whose ideal job would involve working with children. “There are not really too many jobs available. Everything is hard--with the economy.”
The summer recreation program in Anaheim, for instance, has 250 applicants for 26 openings that start at $5.08 an hour. The number of hopefuls may double by the time the positions are filled May 20, said Robin Metz, recreation services specialist for the city.
Youths face less variety as well as fewer jobs, said JoAnn Henkel, a work-experience teacher at Alta Loma High School in Rancho Cucamonga. Earlier this week, the only employer listed on the campus job board was a nearby water theme park.
“Students still get jobs in fast food and restaurants,” said Henkel. But, she added, “we used to get office jobs and more retail jobs and some manufacturing jobs. The variety has become limited.”
While most youths may dream of working as a Huntington Beach lifeguard at $10.47 an hour, the reality is quite different. Most will end up working at less glamorous and lower-paying jobs at fast-food stands, retail stores and amusement parks.
But competition for even these jobs will be keener.
Disneyland reports an increase in applicants for its 1,800 summer jobs, which start at $5.05 an hour. This year, there are five applicants for every position--versus four last year. Furthermore, demand for temporary workers may not be as high because fewer year-round workers are leaving.
“People are sticking around in their jobs this year,” said Jeri Beals, manager of West Coast employment for Walt Disney Attractions.
Knott’s Berry Farm also has had less trouble finding qualified applicants for its 2,000 summer jobs.
“It’s a little bit easier this year. Other (employers) are not hiring as many people,” said Pete Roberts, employment manager for Knott’s, where the starting hourly wage for summer workers is below $5.
The leading source of summer jobs is the fast-food industry, say employment officials. In fact, at San Diego State University, the number of available fast-food jobs remained steady while total employment listings plummeted nearly 32% in April.
Fast-food jobs, however, appear to be the last resort for most young people.
“It’s not their first choice,” said Barbara Friedberg, coordinator of student employment at San Diego State. “Students in college have always been somewhat choosy. They feel they want something that has a certain amount of dignity. There is a lot of frustration, because the market is not able to give them what they want.”
Fast-food jobs are also unappealing because most start at the minimum wage, $4.25 an hour--or $3.60 an hour under the state minimum for youths below 18. Starting pay at Carl’s Jr., for instance, ranges from $4.25 to $4.60 an hour, depending on location.
“Our Orange County kids are not interested in working for less than the minimum wage--and some for not less than $5 an hour,” said McWilliam at Brea-Olinda High. “If someone offers them less than that, they won’t take it.”
Bob Gomez, a career counselor at UC Irvine, said student job-seekers are facing a “tough, lean” summer.
The university’s recent career fair drew 40 firms, down from 50 a year ago. Gomez attributed the decline to fewer representatives from city and county governments, which, like many private employers, have cut back on hiring.
But Gomez said the job fair also had some bright spots. Several companies were offering student internships in sought-after technical fields, and one marketing company was looking for college students to drive a van to beaches and concerts for a “Pepsi-Cola Chill Out” promotional campaign.
TEEN-AGE UNEMPLOYMENT National quarterly unemployment rates* for teen-agers 16 to 19. Figures are not seasonally adjusted.
df BLACK LATINO WHITE MARCH 1990 28.0% 18.3% 13.7% JUNE 1990 31.5% 21.0% 13.6% SEPT. 1990 30.8% 18.1% 12.7% DEC. 1990 33.9% 21.0% 13.7% MARCH 1991 37.4% 21.8% 16.6%
