National Review, April 15, 2026
The Wall Street Journal has published what may be the most Wall-Street-Journal-y piece on immigration imaginable.
It’s on the difficulty restaurants are having in finding and keeping dishwashers, a situation exacerbated by Orange Man Bad.
The context:
More than 12 million people work in the U.S. restaurant and bar industry. Dishwashers occupy one of the humblest rungs, but they are among the most badly needed. ...
Rick Cardenas, CEO of Olive Garden parent Darden Restaurants, said dishwashers are his top employment concern. ...
[Dishwashers are] essential workhorses, often the last to leave at night, after mopping floors and taking out the trash. ...
“Without them, our operation would cease,” said Nichole Thomson, the restaurant’s general manager.
Wow, a job so “badly needed” and “essential” must command really good wages, right? Not exactly:
Dishwashers’ pay averages around $32,500 a year, ranking in the bottom third of restaurant jobs, according to jobs platform Indeed.
As a result:
Restaurant and other related service workers quit at the highest rates of any industry tracked by the federal government on average ... .
Fifty-four percent of sit-down restaurants surveyed by the National Restaurant Association said they had fewer-than-average applicants for kitchen-support positions last year.
I washed dishes at my first jobs — what about hiring American young people?
Kevin Murphy, a professor of restaurant management at the University of Central Florida who spent years running restaurants, said many young people are absorbed in social media and other activities. “This doesn’t motivate them to work,” he said.
What would we do without experts? It’s the smartphones! And that might be part of it, but our research suggests it’s also immigration:
Comparisons across states in 2017 show that in the 10 states with the largest shares of immigrant workers, just 36 percent of U.S.-born teens were in the summer labor force. In contrast, in the 10 states with the smallest shares of immigrant workers, 49 percent of teens were in the labor force.
Back to the Journal article. What is the industry lobbyists’ response to all this?
Restaurant trade groups have been pushing the White House and Congress to create a visa program for lower-skilled immigrant workers.
“Solution: More Immigration!” is an X joke of mine, but they’re doing the joke.
But some restaurants are responding to the market signal called a “labor shortage” by investing in market responses instead of investing in lobbyists. The owners of Gramercy Tavern in New York, for instance, are “providing meals and family discounts to help keep its dishwashers.”
Here’s an even more aggressive response:
Chicago-based John’s Food and Wine, which serves a $52 red snapper and an $83 steak, charges a 20% service fee across all orders, divided up among hourly staff. Last year, the restaurant’s dishwashers averaged earnings of $70,000 as a result. “They are highly valued and their value comes with being paid well,” said Tom Rogers, the restaurant’s co-owner.
The result? “The restaurant has had two of its three dishwashers since around the time it opened two years ago.”
There’s also the crazy option of increasing worker productivity:
Sushi chain Kura Sushi is going so far as to import robotic dishwashers from Japan for $15,000 each to ease the strain.
Why were robotic dishwashers developed in Japan and not here? Because Japan doesn’t have mass low-skilled immigration.