Page 12 - BusinessWest March 31, 2021

Editorial
ETourist Economy Is Coming Back
very sector of the economy, and every business, large or year — when people who spent their time off in 2020 (if they had small, has been impacted by this global pandemic. But any) on the back deck, might instead be spending some money this region’s large and important hospitality and tourism taking in all that Western Mass. has to offer.
sector has easily been the hardest-hit. This good news is tempered by the hard reality that we just don’t
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The hotels, restaurants, tourists attractions, event venues, and cultural institutions have been pummeled by this crisis. Some have not survived; those that have are battered and bruised, and that goes for small mom-and-pop operations, the $1 billion MGM Springfield resort casino, and everything in between.
As the calendar turns to April, though, there can finally be senti- ment that the very worst is behind this sector and that better times are to come — though myriad challenges remain.
First, the good news. As various stories in this issue reveal, there are positive signs and ample amounts of optimism about what’s in store for this sector. Tanglewood, Jacob’s Pillow, and other renowned cultural institutions have announced that, after canceling everything (or staging only virtual performances) in 2020, they will have sched- ules of live offerings this year — although they will be different.
Meanwhile, there is a great deal of talk of pent-up demand, and new terms working their way into the lexicon like ‘revenge spend- ing’ and ‘vacation retaliation.’ All this points to a summer — and a
Opinion
know what this year portends when it comes to people getting back in the water — literally and figuratively. There is pent-up demand, yes, and many people certainly have money to spend. But when the time comes, will people be willing to gather in large numbers? Will there be a Big E, and if so, how many people will attend? Will people return to the casino? And when can MGM again stage the live events that bring so many people to downtown Springfield? Can the Basketball Hall of Fame bounce back from a dismal year? Will people have an appetite for crowded (or more crowded) res- taurants? When will conventions return?
These are just some of the questions that will determine the short-term fate of the region’s tourism and hospitality industry. For the long term, we know the health and well-being of this some- times-overlooked sector is absolutely critical to the economy of this region, and to its quality of life.
Thankfully, there are many signs that it’s ready to officially roar back to life. v
Preparing Work for Women
rate leadership leads to a 15% increase in profitability for a typical firm. Researchers attributed this to “increased skill diversity within top management,” which translates to an ability to encourage better employee performance and stronger recruitment, pro- motion, and retention of talent (the women who otherwise would have left due to gen- der discrimination).
• Shift the ways we define ‘women’s work’ and what it’s worth. In 2017, 64.2% of mothers were the primary or co-breadwin- ners for their families. Our jobs are central to supporting our families and ourselves, yet they are routinely undervalued and underpaid (see teachers, 76% women; social workers, 83% women; and healthcare work- ers, 85% women). Questions to consider: if more men entered these fields, as they did with computer programming, a skill once tied to women’s secretarial roles, would wages go up? If they did, would more men opt to enter these fields? This chicken-egg scenario inevitably leads to the same take- away: these critical roles need higher pay to truly represent their value to our society.
We’re living in remarkable times, when we’re not just dreaming of change, we’re demanding it — for our daughters, sisters, friends, co-workers, and, obviously, our stu- dents. Women’s employment isn’t expected to return to pre-pandemic rates until 2024 (men will get there in 2023), and the road back can’t be paved only with good inten- tions. A recovery won’t do — what we really need is a reimagining. v
Sandra Doran is president of Bay Path University.
y Sandra Doran
BW
ork has always been a women’s issue. Whether we work or not, the types of jobs we do, how
ized country in the world offers. At the same time, the nearly universal pivot to remote work arrangements should inspire us all to develop schedules and create resources that expand the flexibility we can offer.
• Expand access to degrees for more women. It’s never been more important for women to get their degrees. It still holds true that women with bachelor’s degrees will earn $630,000 more over the course of their careers than high-school graduates. Women with graduate degrees earn $1.1 million more. Most women who left the workforce exited the hospitality, health-services, and retail sectors, where the majority of jobs
do not require a degree and the majority of workers don’t have one. Due to their dis- proportionate representation in these sec- tors, fewer black and Hispanic women are working now than any other demographic. Creating access to degrees and providing the support to help women complete them can have a transformational impact on the types of jobs women fill and the amount of money they earn.
• Put more women in charge of more companies. Today, there are actually fewer women in rising management roles than there were in 2019, even though having more women in leadership roles isn’t just good for women, it’s better for business. Although men and women start in roughly the same positions, by age 30 to 44, 36%
of men become supervisors or managers, compared to 30% of women. By age 45 and older, 12% of men ascend to an executive- level role, while only 6% of women do. A Harvard Business School study found that having women represent 30% of corpo-
much we are paid, and how far we can advance, it’s all shaped by our experiences as women, and this, in turn, shapes the central mission at Bay Path University. Therefore, it has been hard to see how deeply the pandemic has thwarted work- ing women. In January, the National Women’s Law Center calculated the per- centage of women working at 57%, the lowest it has been since 1988.
As the conversation grows louder,
and the issues more pressing, this is our moment to seize, for making changes that are long overdue. At Bay Path, we’re dou- bling down on our commitment to prepar- ing women for the career world, but the pandemic has confirmed it’s high time that businesses, organizations, and policymak- ers get on board with preparing the career world for women. Here are a few places to start.
• Support mothers. Over the last 30 years, childcare costs have increased
by 70%, while real median wages have increased by a scant 7%. The cost of child- care in the U.S. and the allegiance to tradi- tional gender roles still forces women into the slow lane of career growth and pushes many to take the off-ramp. Taking time away from one’s career puts women at risk of re-entering the labor market at a lower entry point than when they left, a scenario that underlies our persistent wage gap. The experiences of mothers during the pandem- ic has led to renewed calls for subsidized childcare, something every other industrial-
12 MARCH 31, 2021
OPINION
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