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UGA, hoteliers and DMOs tell Senate committee Georgia needs major workforce investment in hospitality
Summary
University of Georgia researchers and industry leaders told a Senate committee that Georgia's hospitality sector employs hundreds of thousands but faces high turnover, relatively low receipts per employee and a growing need for coordinated workforce development spanning high school, postsecondary and employer training.
University of Georgia hospitality researchers and tourism executives told a Georgia Senate study committee that workforce development is central to expanding tourism and converting marketing gains into reliable jobs.
"There are 486,000 Georgians who rely on this industry," said Michael Owens, president and CEO of the Tourism Leadership Council, citing the sector's employment scale as part of his presentation. Owens and other witnesses said the industry provides upward mobility but is highly dependent on entry-level hiring and retention.
Dr. John Salazar, head of hospitality at the University of Georgia, presented state labor and receipts data and flagged two structural challenges: lower receipts per employee in accommodation and food compared with other sectors, and a high turnover rate among stable positions in the hospitality NAICS categories. "We have the largest turnover stable ratio of all the NAICS categories in Georgia," Salazar said, and added that lower receipts per employee make productivity and retention investments especially important.
Education pipeline and scale
Salazar told the committee there are roughly 40,000 high-school students currently enrolled in hospitality or career-technical tracks who could form an entry workforce if pathways to employment and college-level training are strengthened. He described University of Georgia extension programs, the Innovation District and Small Business Development Center partnerships as existing assets that can scale workforce training and entrepreneurship.
Panel recommendations
Witnesses urged the committee to consider:
- Sustained investment in hospitality workforce development programs that connect high-school career-technical courses to college certificates and employer internships. Dr. Salazar said, "We have 40,000 kids in high school that want to get into these jobs in hospitality and tourism that are in the hospitality track for the career technical ag education program."
- Employer-driven training and retention supports, including career ladders, on-the-job training, and recognition of hospitality as a pathway to management roles.
- Cross-institutional coordination: Salazar and industry leaders recommended closer cooperation among DMOs, community colleges, the Carl Vinson Institute, and the Small Business Development Center to align curricula with employer needs.
Why it matters
Speakers emphasized that tourism's low receipts-per-employee figure means growth depends on hiring and retaining trained workers. "If we're going to have a ladder of success, there better be rungs at the bottom," Owens said, adding that the sector offers broad upward mobility for workers who start in entry-level roles.
Next steps
The committee said it will collect additional data and consider workforce recommendations alongside marketing and funding proposals in subsequent meetings.
