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May 8, 2013 11:44 AM
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All contents © Index Newspapers LLC
800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
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dumbass.
jobs like that are where kids learn life skills.
of course, in Gommorah, life skills are scarce.
kids who don't grow up with a married mother and father are less likely to learn them.
another symptom of your failing shitty civilization.
And when it don't work, a million dollar Golden Parachute out to fuck up some other company.
But, oh, no, that would be so wrong, paying employees a decent wage? Employees don't deserve it, they don't work hard enough, aren't dedicated enough. Such fucking crap. The assholes at the top of the food chain are the problem. There aren't enough bonuses and salary increases and benefits for them, there can never be enough FOR THEM. They will never understand that treating your employees well means they will treat your customers well. Oh, there are a few out there that do get it, Starbucks, Costco, to name a couple, but on the whole, big businesses today just keep taking advantage of employees because they can. And they will.
I, too, work for a big box employer that has cut staff to the bone resulting in customers waiting. The few of us left aren't in great moods, though we are grateful to still have the jobs. We're tired, physically and emotionally weary. It is hard to muster up a smile. I try not to take it out on the customers, I do the best I can. I don't need to be told I'm a bad employee. Of course I am, no one can do the job of three people and do it well. I'd like to see someone in their cushy corporate job work in a store these days. They wouldn't last an hour. Even our district manager doesn't come around much anymore because she knows she'd be forced to help us on the sales floor!
Obviously the next discussion will be about how to make unhappy workers pretend not to be unhappy more effectively so that customers don't pick up on it.
Tangentially, those customers that not only look into their bag at the counter, but drag out the inspection like a drill Sargent at bed check, really make my blood boil. Getting your order fucked up is all built into the price fuckers, play the game and stop being a dick about it!
The current unemployment rate among teens 16 - 19 is around 23.8%; the only demographic where unemployment has actually INCREASED in the past several years.
And the reason for this is because these sorts of jobs, once considered entry-level, are now in large part performed by adults: adults with college degrees, older adults, and adults with "life skills" up the wazoo, whose previous full-time, living-wage jobs have either been off-shored or eliminated outright, thanks to your friends in corner offices and board rooms across the country.
So, if you want to go and blame anyone for this "failing, shitty civilization" that's where you need to redirect your finger-pointing ass-wipe, because that's what's forcing hundreds of thousands of otherwise competent adults to take these shitty jobs in an economic system that doesn't value the skills they've already spent a lifetime acquiring.
Why should they improve if all that happens is the CEO and senior execs get a bigger payout?
Class War, baby!
@1, congrats you win the Don't Know Most About Macroeconomics of the Day award.
I am not saying that these companies do not need to treat their employees better, or can not afford higher wages, but there is a lot going on apart from just wages. I would bet hiring and training practices have more to do with it.
The inverse of the argument, of course, is that people who don't rise to such exalted positions as "management consultant" or "Asshat in Chief" must not be worthy, and therefore it's totally ok to shit all over them. After all, if those peons chose not to go to college, right? Or chose to study English instead of Business/Marketing with a minor in Assholery, right? So they deserve to be on the receiving end of inhuman working conditions!
Ugh. A big, warm Internet hug to you for doing such tough work.
Back when I was a corporate wage slave, this item was always especially galling. So you're going to tell me how great my work is, and how much customers and management appreciate it, but then not going to actually reward me for it? Giving recognition without the compensation that goes with it in the form of a bonus or wage is nothing but a fucking insult.
Let's face it: most people don't work for fun. We work because we need to earn a living. And we work hard because we hope to earn a better living.
Recognizing our work, and inducing even more work by dangling the prospect of a better wage which never materializes—that is the essence of bad management and bad workplaces.
And people wonder why they get grouchy employees.
It makes it seem less like you have absolutely nothing of value to say or add.
@28: I said at the end of my comment they can and should treat their employees better. All I am saying is that if we are just using the variable of wages, it does not offer much insight into the question posed by the original post.
OTOH, at the end of their six months or so of interning (because, you know, internships aren't permanent), they'll walk out the door with some actual skills that will help them to leverage somewhat higher-paying jobs than they would have otherwise, in addition to receiving credits toward the college degrees most of them are undoubtedly pursuing at the same time.
All I said was that they have customer service that is worlds better than McDonalds, in my experiences. I mean, do people just shut their brains off around here when "Chik-fil-a" is mentioned and just go into some kind of weird attack mode? I expect much better reading comprehension from Sloggers.
Also, pretty much all I am seeing in the first couple pages of your link are glowing reviews, so I think you should find a new one that proves your point. But since I never said Chik-fil-a is a good place to work, I do not really give a shit anyway.
The Japanese manage to do it.
You would think so, wouldn't you? But, at the same time Costco is doing right by their employees, they are under constant pressure from their shareholders to trim wages & benefits in order to increase stock value. The fact that management has resisted to-date is admirable, but one wonders how long they can keep doing so given the ravenous desire for "profit uber alles" that permeates our contemporary economic system.
I was preparing to say something similar, except that I don't think Costco's human shareholders are exerting that pressure. It's the mutual fund managers, "investors", banksters, and The Street who constantly badger Costco.
They can't stand it that the company makes money hand over fist -- and makes money for its real-person shareholders -- while flouting their (mis)advice.
@42: Same story also notes that Costco shares have led their competitors' by 1% on average over the last 5 years, while McD's have been almost 3% below their competition in the same period. Kind of hard for shareholders to argue that screwing the employees is going to help Costco's bottom line.
Story at Quartz: http://qz.com/78251/mcdonalds-costco-ceo…
It's free labor for the Stranger, and they should be ashamed. No way could Savage defend it if you put him on the spot.
You tell em Pridge!
Let us help you out, old chap....
"And the reason for this is because these sorts of jobs, once considered entry-level, are now in large part performed by adults: adults with college degrees (in art or English) or , older adults, and adults with "life skills" up the wazoo, whose job skills, sadly, did not keep up with the demands of the modern economy."
FLIPPING BURGERS WILL NEVER PROVIDE A "LIVING WAGE".
"Adults" who are working as non-managerial positions at McDonalds are not contributing enough to the economy to justify a "living wage" (or paid health care...)
Either they don't have the job skills to get a decent wage or they don't have the life skills to find work that matches their skills.
FLIPPING BURGERS IS ENTRY LEVEL STOOGE WORK.
Hey, look on the bright side. Thomas Jefferson owned slaves too.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_vqIGTKu…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6E8H3C1C…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1yAJk4bP…
Said nobody, ever.
Why do you vegans like watching dead animals so much. You are a bunch of fuckign sickos.
You can avoid the animal cruelity issue by paying attention to where you buy your meat.
I recomend this guy http://www.baronfarms.com/
55: "Humane" meat is hardly any better than what McDonald's does. http://youtu.be/pJeyxKWI_vA
In either case, if you're not...sheesh. Thankfully you have to live in that brain, rather than I.
Q: How can you tell if someone's a vegan?
A: Oh, don't worry... they'll tell you!
Not according to the ones with whom I've interacted over the years. They felt they were receiving plenty of value in exchange for their brief stint of labor: experience, opportunity, connections, recommendations - so, who am I to tell them they're not?
Besides, what is an intern in essence but a volunteer? Would you posit that there is no intrinsic value in the act of volunteering, even for a for-profit enterprise? If so, I would have to most heartily beg to differ, speaking as someone who spends a goodly portion of his non-working waking hours engaged in volunteer activities.
You may suggest that such equivalencies aren't to be taken seriously, but why are they less serious than asking us to assume that the life of a cow is something about which we should be morally concerned?
The fact is, the only reason I don't eat you, or you me, is that we have a social contract with one another. That is largely a function of our being the same species, thus sharing the same essential properties and modes of communication; there's no more reason that we should have a contract with the cow than there is for the lion to have a contract with the gazelle.
So kudos for your choices. But don't frame them as moral imperatives.
Just because they don't mind doesn't mean they're not being screwed.
That's one of the problems with U.S. society today - we're too quick to excuse irresponsibility and sloth and then try to blame our behaviors on someone else when we are all fully reponsible for our own actions. "Oh, the poor little thing! I don't blame him if he left out half your order and got your change wrong. He's only making $7.70 an hour! How could he help it?" Again, horseshit. you don't like the job, complain or leave. Or form a union. Or petition Congress to raise wages. Or don't take it to begin with. Whatever. But you can't accept and be entrusted with a job and then just decide you're going to start making your own rules about how that job is performed.
Then I had my 3-month performance review. Not a word about my accomplishments, but I was marked down because I didn't "smile enough". I didn't get a raise because I didn't smile enough. That's the kind of thinking that this man indulged in. Just smile, and everyone will be happy.
Luckily, I was able to find a much better job and moved on, before I smacked that manager in her always-smiling face.
You toss axioms about like a fundamentalist. There are no self-evident truths.
Americans don't want service, they want slaves. Read any number of Yelp reviews for an insight to people's shitty existence where they expect a soda to never be less than 1/4 empty.