With unemployment remaining below 4%, Maine employers are facing an ever greater scarcity of job-seekers. Around the state, employers are stepping up their hiring efforts, offering signing bonuses, a wider range of benefits, flexible work arrangements and, with some reluctance, higher pay. Even with the added perks, they often end up with no applicants.
Mike Hart, director of sales and marketing at Green Thumb Farms in Fryeburg, has helped develop innovative products for both wholesale and retail markets. The Cold River Gold potato, for example, is featured in restaurants such as Portland's <b>Duckfat</b>, which uses them in its fries.
From 2012-16, fewer than a third of working-age Mainers with a disability were employed, compared to 80% employment for others, according to the Maine Department of Labor. But a number of Maine employers are countering that trend by offering jobs to people with disabilities.
Maine is on pace to record a post-recession high in building permits. At the current rate, Maine would have 4,711 by year's end, topping last year's 4,607 building permits issued, according to the U.S. Census.
In researching job opportunities, millennials are seeking firms that offer flexible scheduling and workplace options, a focus on work-life balance, plus interesting challenges, career advancement opportunities and community engagement.
Dead River Co., Central Maine Power and Appalachian Mountain Club are among the Maine employers that are partnering with the Maine Community College System to develop short-term training programs in response to the state's workforce crisis.
