Food Service Labor Force: Moving Up within Institutions

In hospital and health care facilities, someone who enters with minimal skills might be trained to become a “food service worker” or a “dietary aide.” They will be asked to perform an array of routine functions in the kitchen, on the tray line, or in dishwashing areas. For these jobs, comprehension of basic written and oral instructions, along with some manual dexterity, are the only prerequisites. Long-term food service workers in the health care facilities tend to be overwhelmingly female. They remain in these positions for many personal reasons: often their lack of education and need for stable income and some minimal benefits precludes their mobility. Many have dependents who need their support for some semblance of security; they become an underclass, poorly trained, with limited mobility or opportunity for career growth. The interest to provide care and nurturing, which may have drawn them into the food service industry, can easily wane with long years of repetitive menu service. Career opportunity may extend to supervisory positions, based on experience, seniority, personality factors, and continued training, which would include basic cooking knowledge and safe food handling, and sometimes based on some standardized testing, but for many people there are limited paths out of these cycles of working poverty, and long years working many hours on one’s feet can take a toll on physical health and mental well-being.