The Hotel Industry Is Rebounding

[impik]

The hotel industry in the United States appears to be rebounding this summer, mainly because of strengthening business travel.

Bjorn Hanson, dean of the Preston Robert Tisch Center for Hospitality, Tourism and Sports Management at New York University, estimated that hotel occupancies in the United States would rise to 63.5 percent from June through August, compared with 60 percent in the same period last year.

He described the increase as “dramatic,” adding: “Typically, the movement would be 1 percent. There is not normally a robust business travel recovery during the summer.”

Mr. Hanson estimated that the number of hotel rooms occupied by both business travelers and groups would be 6 to 7 percent higher this summer than last, while the rooms occupied by leisure travelers would rise slightly less, 5 to 6 percent. He attributed the increase in business travel to a stronger economy, and the improvement in leisure travel to greater confidence in the economy and “the expectation that rates will start to increase, and that this is a great time to take advantage of them.”



http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/27/business/27hotels.html?_r=2&ref=business

[IndianaGreen]

1. The hotel industry is rebounding on the backs of the hotel workers

Here is a thread on the real situation that I posted in the Indiana forum:

Worker protest at Hyatt results in 41 arrests

Issues of pay, use of temp workers, efforts to unionize fuel sit-in

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=151x7670

[DJ13]

2. Damn right

My wife works in the largest hotel in our area and hasnt gotten a raise in almost 2 years, and the hours are reduced even still.

[babylonsister]

3. "No news is good news", at least not here. nt

[IndianaGreen]

5. The reality is how the hotel workers are being exploited to make the owners more profitable

Read the article I linked to.

While you were typing your stuff in DU, I was outside the Hyatt supporting the hotel workers.

[babylonsister]

7. And maybe more people are actually traveling with

eventual increases in hotel workers' salaries to follow. They'll never get paid more if people don't frequent the hotels.

Why is everything so negative with you?

[IndianaGreen]

8. Hotels are booked solid, yet the hotel workers are getting the shaft

That is a reality that perhaps doesn't fit that universe you inhabit,

152 arrested at San Francisco hotel protest
(AP) – 3 days ago

SAN FRANCISCO — More than 150 hotel workers and labor union supporters have been arrested in San Francisco after gathering outside a hotel as part of a nationwide protest seeking better wages and working conditions.

Organizers say an estimated 1,400 people took part in the demonstration Thursday at the Grand Hyatt San Francisco.

The protest was one of several across the country planned against Chicago-based Hyatt, by hospitality worker union Unite Here.

San Francisco police say 152 people were arrested after they disobeyed orders to leave. They were taken to a nearby police station and released.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jpKvs67g_qso0gpiwxeZNC-c5-pAD9H4IGDG3

The hotel owners talk about talking to the workers, but it is just that, talk for public consumption.

[babylonsister]

9. Maybe in SF they are. But regardless, what do you suggest,

are you hopeful the economy doesn't rebound and people in the hotel industry lose jobs? I'm not saying some aren't getting screwed, this OP was about positive economic news. Get your head out of your butt long enough to understand what I was responding to.

And you don't have a damn clue what universe I inhabit, despite your condescending tone.

Go peddle it on someone else.

[IndianaGreen]

10. Here is an excerpt of my Indiana link, posted on this thread and Indiana forum

Karl Frederiksen has been a model employee of the Hyatt Regency Downtown and makes pretty good money, especially compared with some of his co-workers. But he's tired of what he sees as the hotel's use of subcontractors to skirt fair pay and benefits.

"These temporary employees are being used in a full-time manner, as permanent workers with no benefits. They have no health insurance, no retirement, nothing," he said. "This is unfair."

http://www.indystar.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=20107230341

One of the hotel workers, a maid, said at the rally that she used to clean 16 rooms during her shift. She is now cleaning 30!

Your bloody "positive news" have a serious downside which you are apparently totally unaware of, or purposely choose to ignore.

[DCBob]

13. Yeah life sucks.. there is unfairness all over this planet.. any idiot knows that..

There are no easy solutions and incessant complaining does not help. Meanwhile hotel workers need jobs to survive. This is "good" news for them.

[IndianaGreen]

16. The rich get richer at the expense of the workers, and you call that good news?

I call it Trickle Down Economics!

[DCBob]

17. In this situation, "a job" is "good news"..

If the rich are getting richer.. well that's another issue that has been going on since the invention of money.

[Hawkowl]

12. That's ludicrous

Are you saying that since hotels will make more in profits due to higher occupancy rates, that they will then pass that on to employees in the form of higher wages? That is not how our economy works. Only if there was a drastic shortage of hotel workers would wages rise.

Seriously, this is the USA, and corporations don't give workers a raise for doing a good job.

[IndianaGreen]

14. Looks like a group of DUers have embraced Reagan's Trickle Down economics

while the rest of us see corporate profits at the expense of the workers, as nothing more than voodoo economics.

[DCBob]

4. Airlines are too.. remarkably..

the new fees and cutbacks on salaries are working. Profits are coming at the expense of workers and customers.

[IndianaGreen]

6. When the economy 'rebounds' it will be the capitalists doing the rebounding

the workers will be the ones being rebounded upon.

[IndianaGreen]

11. AFL-CIO: Workers Protest Mistreatment by Hyatt

Workers Protest Mistreatment by Hyatt

by James Parks, Jul 22, 2010

Thousands of hotel workers in 15 cities across North America have been taking to the streets today to protest the practices of Hyatt and its billionaire owners—the politically influential Pritzker family.

The hotel industry has rebounded quickly from the recession but hotel workers have not shared in the profits they helped create. Nationwide, more than 115,000 jobs in the hotel industry have been cut since the recession began in 2008, including 46,000 in the first quarter of 2010 alone.

As of March 31, Hyatt reported it had more than $1.3 billion in cash available. Yet Hyatt workers have endured staff cuts, reduced hours, and excessive injury rates. In one stark example, Hyatt fired the entire housekeeping staff from its three Boston-area hotels and replaced them with minimum-wage workers from a subcontracting agency. While many hotel workers live in poverty, the Pritzker family cashed out more than $900 million as part of Hyatt’s initial public offering last November.

Says UNITE HERE President John Wilhelm:

Hotel guests are returning and investors are trumpeting the recovery of the hotel industry, but in city after city, Hyatt is taking unfair advantage of its employees.

Hyatt should be leading the way to make hotel jobs good jobs; instead they are forcing workers to make do with less pay, worse benefits and unsafe working conditions.

The most prominent member of the Pritzker family is Penny Pritzker, the former national finance chairwoman of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign. She now serves as a member of the President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board.

This year, citywide contracts covering 45,000 union hotel workers in 10 cities in the United States and Canada will expire and hotel workers are being asked to take concessions.

“As a single mom, I am outraged by Hyatt’s proposals that continue to demand unaffordable concessions from us, especially as they continue to expand and grow” said Caddie Lin, a housekeeper and member of UNITE HERE Local 2 at San Francisco’s Grand Hyatt.

http://blog.aflcio.org/2010/07/22/workers-protest-mistreatment-by-hyatt/

Check out the political contributions by the Pritzker family. Google is your friend!

[JustAnotherGen]

15. My 62 year old mother

Is working as a director of sales in a hotel - she's now been working 17 days straight .. . no days off.

And she sees it from the top down. I have a lot of thoughts on where the industry was at a time when a working mother could bring her daughter to the hotel when the little girl was sick, and work out of a room. In a way - it was a good business for a working mom to be in that wanted to climb the management chain.

But the same woman - who is terrified to retire because health care would be insurmountable -

Is 62 (turning 63 in November) and working insane hours doing not just her 'sales' job, but cleaning rooms, working banquets, etc. etc at a 'top tier' hotel because the Owners don't want to pay people more, hire more people, pay people what they are worth, etc. etc.

I for one am GLAD that the hotel workers are fighting the owners. The hotel management companies have abused everyone from their GM's down to the houseman for 10 years now without any way for the employees to fight back.

I'll ziplip on what the 'change' was but suffice to say - it's all part of the caste system . . . *tiptoes away*