COVID-19 has had an impact on people’s employment across the country, with 20-40+ million people losing their jobs completely according to an article by Eric Morath in The Wall Street Journal on June 3, 2020.

Many students rely on summer or after school employment to help pay tuition, and share in the challenges facing  others during the pandemic.

Mount Carmel senior Andrew Robustelli, when asked about how things were going at his job, noted that he has “actually worked a lot more now than I used to, because less people are working so there are more open shifts.”

However, Robustelli understands that his good fortune results from others who have lost jobs or become ill,  putting added stress on workers who remain on the job.

But Robstelli’s good fortune in not widely shared.  According to an article by Riley De Leon published on the CNBC website on November 13, 2020, 76% of workers under 30 are looking for new job opportunities.

Another MC student, senior Angel Samperio, says that his workplace isn’t handling the pandemic well, and not everyone follows the proper precautions which makes his job.

“My workplace does a poor job at mask-wearing. I have already suspended two employees for not wearing their masks and written up multiple employees for not having their masks over their noses.

“There are no temperature checks and I have brought it up in every manager meeting and no one seems to listen. I tell my employees to wash their hands and wear gloves, but this is commonly ignored and I’m getting tired of writing people up and my boss is doing nothing about it.”

The blatant disregard for safety precautions that Samperio has experienced will only increase the longer the pandemic goes on. With people not taking it seriously, they place themselves, their coworkers and customers in danger.