for college. Others have spent their summers
playing competitive sports.
This summer, things are rather different.
After collapsing last spring, the economy
has rebounded much faster than expected.
Restaurants, bars, retail shops and amusement
parks have been overwhelmed by pent-up
demand from consumers who had mostly
hunkered down for a year or more.
Now, those businesses need employees to
handle the influx and are scrambling to find
enough. The vaccine rollout was just starting in
April and May, when employers typically start
hiring for summer. Some of these businesses
delayed their hiring decisions, unsure whether
or when the economy would fully reopen.
Foreign workers, brought in on J-1 work-and-
study visas, typically filled many such summer
jobs. But President Donald Trump suspended
those visas as a coronavirus precaution, and the
number of U.S.-issued J-1 visas tumbled 69% in
the fiscal 2020 year — to 108,510, from 353,279
the year before.
In past years, for example, foreigners visiting
the U.S. on visas took filled 180 summer jobs
at Big Kahuna’s water park in Destin, Florida.
Last year, there were just three. This year, eight.
Desperate to attract local teens, Big Kahuna’s,
which is owned by Boomers Parks, is now
paying $12 an hour, up from less than $10 an
hour in past years.
Compounding the labor squeeze, many older
Americans have been slow to respond to a record
number of job openings. Some have lingering
health concerns or trouble arranging or affording
child care at a time when schools are transitioning