Originally Posted by The Road Goes On Forever

I'm not going to argue with you, but you're completely incorrect. Looking at the total number of jobs is useless. Chains continue to open more locations. What matters and what I'm talking about, are the number of people that actually staff new and existing hotels because that number is down and will continue to go down in the years to come. I've been in the industry with Marriott and now with Hilton long enough to have seen on property staffing reduced permanently several times. First after 9/11 (I was directly impacted by this when Marriott created MBS which eliminated a large portion of their on property accounting staff at their managed locations), then during/after the Great Recession and now with Covid.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand and see what the industry has done compared to five years ago just with reduced housekeeping service and the corresponding smaller staffing footprint in that area. Those jobs have been permanently eliminated by owners and management companies. AI is also already reducing and remodeling staffing in the sales and revenue management areas. Between AI and continued increased app usage, major staffing changes are coming from the industry whether the travelling public likes it or not to front line operational staffing as well. The end game is the smallest FTE footprint possible. It's not if, just when, and how it's implemented.