The other side of a recession

The local restaurant owner complains because he has to pay a dishwasher $10 an hour. He’s got to pay almost 30 percent above minimum wage because nobody will take the job for less. As an employer, that hurts.

Here at The Press, we’re struggling to find people to deliver the paper. It’s a good way to earn extra money — to pay for a kid’s college, make a new-car payment or plenty of other possibilities — but it requires a high level of self-discipline and motivation.

The sob stories of employers and others go on and on. In a matter or hours, readers/employers also brought to our attention:

- Someone whose driveway needs to be completely redone, and has been turned down by four concrete contractors;

- A plumber who has used internet sites trying to attract a journeyman plumber in the $60,000 range, with benefits, and has had zero responses in two years;

- Members of a church in the beginning stages of a million-dollar renovation, but they’re worried, reading local news stories, that no contractor will be able to keep subs on the job long enough to finish the project.

Of course, these tales of woe and fear are augmented by larger-scale examples of demand far out-stripping supply. In early June we reported the city of Coeur d’Alene being forced to delay a major road project on Government Way. The reason: Only one bid came in — everybody’s busy, you see — and that bid was $1.4 million more than the projected cost of $4.24 million.

Don’t ask the Coeur d’Alene School District for sympathy, either. It has a huge wad of cash for property and a new elementary school building, but speculators are keeping a lid on any property sale, and then there’s the question — who has time to build a big new school?

As newspaper stories have chronicled, the district also has challenges finding employees whose criminal records are neither too extensive nor too serious. (OK, that’s a bit of a cheap shot, but there’s some truth to it, too.) The Kootenai County Sheriff’s Office is trying to find deputies for its upcoming jail expansion, and guess what? Only two deputies had been hired out of some 300 applications since December. The two main reasons, according to Sheriff Ben Wolfinger: applicants’ drug use and lying on their applications.

Our conclusion? Be grateful that we’re on the flip side of a serious recession.

These times won’t last, and when they’re gone, we’ll wonder why we were so upset.