“Plumbing Industry Is Throwing the Kitchen Sink at Job Candidates”

(p. A1) FORT COLLINS, Colo.–The fast-growing business offers all the perks a pampered Silicon Valley tech worker might expect: An on-site tap flows with craft beer and the kitchen is stocked with locally roasted espresso beans. There is a putting green and a smoker for brisket lunches. Next up: a yoga studio.
Welcome to the gushing job market…for plumbers.
Colorado’s Neuworks Mechanical Inc. employs 75 plumbers but needs 15 to 20 more. To keep them happy, it offers “a lot of Zen,” says business-development manager Jackie Sindelar. That includes a sharing exercise that “brings out your raw emotions and makes you vulnerable,” she says.
Drained from a labor shortage, the plumbing industry is throwing the kitchen sink at job candidates.
Bonfe’s Plumbing, Heating & Air Service Inc. of South St. Paul, Minn., boasts an array of arcade games and a “quiet room”–a plush hangout space with insulated walls painted a calming sky blue. It has a lockable door, a comfy couch, a recliner and a sound machine that babbles with the soothing audio of ocean waves.
. . .
U.S. job openings hit a record 6.6 million in March, with the construction industry–where plumbers are heavily employed–seeing one of the largest jumps.
Building, needed repairs and retirements are fueling demand for plumbers at the same time the U.S. jobless rate in April fell below 4% for the first time since late 2000.
The annual median pay for plumbers, pipefitters and steamfitters was nearly $53,000 a year in 2017, according to federal data, but it isn’t uncommon to see jobs advertised for far higher wages, from $70,000 up to six figures.

For the full story, see:
Levitz, Jennifer. “Plumbing Firms, Drained by Labor Shortage, Tap Perks.” The Wall Street Journal (Thursday, May 24, 2018): A1 & A10.
(Note: ellipsis internal to sentence, in original; ellipsis between paragraphs, added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date May 23, 2018, and has the title “Perks for Plumbers: Hawaiian Vacations, Craft Beer and ‘a Lot of Zen’.” The last sentence quoted above appeared in the online, but not in the print, version of the article.)

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