How Exactly is Disney Planning on Filling 13,000 Jobs?

You’ve probably noticed something about the surrounding area if you’ve left the Walt Disney World bubble in Orlando. It is in a perpetual state of construction.

There are new shops, restaurants, hotels, and apartments/condos. And that doesn’t include the seemingly never-ending highway construction. Just stay away from I-4.

At the Walt Disney Company’s earnings meeting this week, Disney CEO Bob Iger announced that the Mouse House will hire an additional 13,000 Cast Members and spend $17 billion at Walt Disney World over the next decade. It appears as though the greater Orlando area is about to get more crowded.

But that now leads to another question: Where will Disney get the people to fill these new Cast Member positions?

According to state data, the unemployment rate in Florida is 2.5 percent, just below the national average of 3.4 percent, which is the lowest in the last 54 years.

In the Orlando/Kissimmee area, the unemployment rate is 2.6 percent, which translates to 37, 124 people currently unemployed. That would seem perfect. Disney gets new Cast Members, and the Orlando area unemployment rate gets closer to zero.

Slight problem. Not all those people can be employed by Disney for various reasons, including criminal records or not meeting the requirements for a particular position.

Disney is going to find another problem with hiring. Its main competitor in Orlando, Universal Studios, is looking to hire 14,000 before the opening of its Epic Universe in the summer of 2025. Universal will hire much sooner than Disney, giving them the edge.

Disney will also be competing with Universal over workers’ pay. While Universal just upped its minimum wage to $17 an hour, Disney reached a contract settlement with Cast Members to raise the minimum wage to $18 an hour.

With CEO Bob Iger pledging $17 billion, who knows what Disney has in store for Walt Disney World, but none of those larger-scale projects are imminent.

The Walt Disney World Resort has several new projects in the works, or that recently opened, including the new Tron Lightcycle/Run at Magic Kingdom and Guardians of the Galaxy Cosmic Rewind at EPCOT. The theme Park wars in central Florida will only escalate as Universal opens its Epic Universe in 2025.

Bob Iger’s announcement comes just days after the Walt Disney Company began laying off thousands of employees in its television division and cut the entire meta division of the company.

So, the question remains unanswered as to exactly where Disney is planning on getting its new Cast Members, but one thing is certain: the construction in the Orlando area isn’t going to end anytime soon. And you should stay away from I-4.

We will keep you updated on the latest news at Disney Fanatic.