Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Hard work can get you far, but you can't do it alone. You have to have people backing you up. If you make minimum wage,you should have at least 3 other people living with you who make that much or a bit more. Put your money up in savings, split it amongst one another. Pulling yourself up by your bootstraps doesn't always work, especially if you're making minimum wage. Sometimes people need help, someone to back another person up. Do you think most people got to the top by themselves without any help?
Some people don't have and can't find 3 other people to live with. They are childfree, don't have parents or siblings or spouses/significant mates. So some can't work for $8 an hour. Even with overtime working 7 days and 12 hour shifts wouldn't be enough.
I believe the basics of the question was "would you rather be jobless or have an $8 an hour job?"
Doesn't explain the dynamics of "jobless". For instance I'm jobless right now, I'm a stay at home mom. I don't need to work for $8 an hour. Someone can be jobless and have savings, unemployment, or other financial means that does not require one to work for $8 an hour which is pennies anyway. But if you were choosing between being on the street(homeless) and $8 an hour that is a completely different scenario and in that case most people would take the minimum wage job.
There are people there who are literally alone left that way by life's unfortunate circumstances : accidents, death of family, divorce, and being the only child in a family where everyone else is either dead or is in another country.
LIFE.
I always have given my employers my best effort no matter what the pay. I feel I am being paid to do a job not judge the wages I have already agreed to. If you feel you should give less effort due to a reduced pay scale then you shouldn't take that job in which someone else would be perfectly happy with. In the long run it actually does people a great dis-service as the employers feel that everyone settling for less money will leave as soon as they find a higher paying job which is not true.
It is very tough to get unskilled jobs now, I found this out years ago when I started looking for my first job. Alot of older people I've talked to on a daily basis have told me it wasn't always this way. I'm not excusing the economy but I believe there is even more to it then just that. People are on a downward spiral. Especially those in power or authority including employers. They are becoming more corrupted and dog eat dog but it is also hurting their business. You've all heard me rail on the hiring process and how I am treated as a job applicant, and as a person with an invisible disability. I am young yet I am trying to make a transition to where I can work and be self-sufficient and not have to live on $400 a month taken from the taxpayers. But I hear the taxpayers saying people like me are just lazy and stealing their money. I don't want your money. I want my own job. But nobody is hiring me and it is because of the new job hunting process and everything else that goes with it. So when you go around persecuting poor people with disabilities be aware that some of us do have a head on our shoulders and have some morals in life. Maybe you should be telling employers to get back to reality and start hiring people and getting rid of all the ridiculous hoops they've created. Like having to have multiple copies of a resume just to work a job that pays $8.00/hr that kids in high school would usually get. I think the day may come when this new hiring oppression really comes back to bite employers in the rear end. I think it already does, like when you see a business shut down. They say it's because of the economy, but there are two sides to every story. You don't know how they could have treated employees, or hundreds of job applicants. Then it becomes like a case of karma.
We are heading towards a vastly underemployed, frustrated, forced out groups of individuals left hanging in an unhappy workforce. All because we want to feel better then someone else, and rely on the almighty dollar. Expect more people to lose it, rising crime rates, more suicides, a downward spiral of society. We are already on the downward spiral.
most people work for close to minimum wage at their first job in high school in college. its a lot different when you don't have any expenses.
If alone, they have no family obligations to prevent them from adding a 2nd job.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.