Worcester Business Journal

12 Worcester Business Journal | May 29, 2023 | wbjournal.com To learn more, contact: Peter Staiti SVP, Commercial Lending Center Manager 100 Front Street, Worcester, MA | 508.769.5725 RocklandTrust.com/Worcester Member FDIC A Local Partner, Financing Businesses Across Worcester County Fitness Facility Real Estate Acquisition $4,150,000 Littleton, MA Recreational Facility Equipment & Working Capital $700,000 Worcester, MA Manufacturing Facility Equipment Purchase $250,000 Worcester, MA Restaurant Equipment & Working Capital $250,000 Whitinsville, MA Multi-Family Investment Real Estate Portfolio Refinance $1,800,000 Worcester, MA Residential Real Estate Construction 228 units $57,000,000 Worcester, MA Industrial Real Estate Construction 135,000 sq. ft. $13,545,000 Worcester, MA Retail Liquor Store Real Estate Refinance $350,000 Millbury, MA F O C U S E N E R G Y & S U S T A I N A B I L I T Y quit their jobs in 2021, it's true," Joseph Fuller and William Kerr wrote in the Harvard Business Review in March 2022. "However, if you consider that number in the context of total employ- ment during the past dozen years… You can see that what we are living through is not just short-term turbulence pro- voked by the pandemic but rather the continuation of a long-term trend." When the Baby Boomer generation reached age 62, which is the age at which workers can start to claim Social Security, in 2008, the generation began to call it quits on work, according to data from the Washington, D.C. non- profit Pew Research Center. Between 2008 and 2019, the retired population ages 55 and older grew by nearly 1 mil- lion retirees per year. In the two years aer 2019, the number of retirees 55 and older grew by 3.5 million. What this means is that there will be openings. Industries have hard a hard time filling jobs, such as the national manufacturing industry, which lost roughly 1.4 million jobs at the onset of COVID and still has 693,000 open manufacturing jobs as of March 2023, according to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. e U.S. utilities, transportation and warehousing sector had major quit rates in the last year with more than 203,000 workers quitting in March 2022 and another 221,000 quitting in March of this year, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Utility training programs Dalton was making a bet when she entered QCC what she studied could one day make her a perfect candidate for a job at the likes of National Grid or Eversource Energy. e utility compa- nies in Massachusetts would need to keep hiring as the industry changed with new technology and power sources coming online like more solar and wind power, as well as electrification of motor vehicles. National Grid has seen the trend lines and needed something to mitigate the loss of workers. In April, the utility company announced a new workforce development effort to provide people from historically underrepresented and marginalized communities career ex- posure, development, and employment opportunities. e new programs would help National Grid replenish its aging and retiring workforce by giving people clear pathways to work through four 0 20% 40% 60% 80% 100% 2019 2020 2021 Age 55+ Age 55-64 Age 65-74 Age 75+ 17.1% 50.3% 66.9% 86.7% Percentage of retired U.S. adults Notes: All dates are for quarter three of the listed year. This is the percentage of adults who are retired, which means adults who are no longer in the workforce due to retirement. Source: Pew Research Center First Lady Jill Biden (center, in purple) toured Eversource's Electric Power Utility Technology partnership at Bunker Hill Community College in Boston. Continued from previous page PHOTO | COURTESY OF EVERSOURCE

• Cover