Landscaping is a never-ending growth business in Illinois. More and more dual-income families don’t have the time to do their own landscaping, so they turn to professionals like those in my trade group to make their properties not only beautiful but environmentally sustainable. It’s a well-paying industry where hard workers can move up very quickly into supervision and management, but that means we need a constant supply of entry-level workers to come in and learn the ropes.
In that respect, we’re a lot like many industries in our booming state. We may currently be ranked lower than other states facing more critical worker shortages, but that could quickly change. Only a year ago, coming out of COVID-19, our state was in far worse shape workforce-wise than it is now.
