OKLAHOMA CITY – Concerns about the pandemic and its impact on businesses and the workforce was the main issue addressed Friday at the Small Business Roundtable with U.S. Rep. Stephanie Bice, R-Oklahoma City, held at Project 3810 and sponsored by the Northwest Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce.
Following introductory remarks from Jill McCartney, president and CEO of the Northwest Oklahoma City Chamber, Bice, the freshman member of representing Oklahoma’s 5th Congressional District, addressed questions given to her by those in the audience comprising of many small business owners and operators.
Bice is visiting constituents during the Congress’s August recess.
Project 3810 is a certified business incubator in the state, with one of the more capital-intensive businesses attached to the incubator being Broke Brewing Company.
Bice acknowledged that the past 18 months had been “tough” for many businesses and one business owner was concerned about the difficulty in hiring new employees.
She concurred that this has been the case in the district, but noted that a “sizable shift” had taken place in the workforce, with those older workers in their late 60s and early 70s, exiting the workforce during the pandemic and not returning.
But it is also the case with younger workers as well. Bice noted a recent stop she made at a local Sonic Drive-In to order an iced tea. But when she went through the drive-thru, she was instructed to go to a bay instead and order there because there was not enough staff to man the drive-thru window.
Another audience member offered a different perspective. He said his tech-centric office was not having trouble hiring people who were “highly skilled,” and he speculated that large corporate outfits like Amazon and Costco have hired many in the metro, taking them from smaller, local businesses and chains.
The business owner added that the Oklahoma City metro has the third lowest unemployment rate in the country and that the complexity of the situation may be one that even Congress cannot fully address.
COLLEGE – NOT FOR ALL
Bice said that a major issue for her – beginning when she was an Oklahoma state senator and continuing as an issue for her on the federal level – is that she “firmly disagrees” with the idea that everyone must go to college.
The notion of everyone needing to go to college has been a mistake, with Bice saying, “I think we’ve done our young people a disservice” because there has been little emphasis on pushing young people into the trades, from IT to plumbing to welding and more.
Bice said she is working on a couple of different programs to highlight the trades.
“There are thousands of welding jobs that go unfilled because you can’t find a welder,” she said, adding that a skilled welder today can go on to make $70,000 or more a year.
“I think it’s going to be a mindset shift for this generation and the next generation to really talk about more entrepreneurship, finding your passion, doing what you love.”
Offering a real-life example, Bice said her garbage disposal at home had broken down and a plumber came out to fix it. Bice asked him how he had become a plumber. He said he graduated from Oklahoma State University with a business degree but wasn’t sure what to do with his life. With a father who owned a plumbing business, a solution was found.
“My dad put me to work in the plumbing business and I loved it,” Bice said the young plumber told her. “I’m working to get my license and take over the family business when my dad retires.”
NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT
Speaking of the National Defense Authorization Act, Bice said a portion of the FY 2022 is to dedicate dollars to bring manufacturing back to U.S. shores, as too much manufacturing is done overseas, particularly in China. This comment came after a member of the audience noted serving on a U.S. Navy submarine and the crew being forced to cannibalize other subs for parts to maintain readiness.
“This is a supply chain issue that has snowballed,” he said of the problems that have faced the supply chain in the United States, particularly during the era of COVID-19.”
Bice concluded: “We’ve got to have a different mindset on how we get things moving or otherwise, we’re going to fall drastically behind. We can’t continue to spend at this pace. It’s unsustainable.”