Letter: Listen to Hilton Head workers

I write in support of Liz Farrell’s column, “If employers want employees, they should start by acting like it.”

Employers, elected and appointed officials, to attract workers, listen and act. You are being handed workforce solutions on a silver platter by your golden geese ... your employees.

Quality, affordable housing is a necessity on Hilton Head Island. Build it and “they” will come in sufficient quantities with the correct qualities. “Those people” allow you, the employers and elected/appointed officials, to earn, profit and generate a phenomenal tax base, and, they want the same experiences and treatment as you and your loyal patrons: Respect. Appreciation. Living wages. Transportation. Quality housing.

We guests receive all of these things. That’s how we can afford to visit Hilton Head and pay you for the quality experiences delivered by your employees. It’s past time to give back to those you are “wishing” to attract to work by following solutions suggested by the employees who provide the services.

We customers pay the wages. We pay the taxes. The employees earn wages that are paid by employers who choose to depress wages, therefore creating a “labor shortage.”

The reality is a purposeful “pay rate shortage.”

Continue withholding solutions from “the others” and look forward to reduced hours, plummeting profits, and the continued disappearing act by “the invisible” workforce.

As Richard Branson says, “Employees come first. If you take care of your employees, your employees will take care of your customers.”

“Deciders,” justly take care of “the providers.”

This story was originally published September 22, 2016 at 10:30 PM with the headline "Letter: Listen to Hilton Head workers."