[DrPizza]

Fast-Food Workers Strike for $15-an-Hour Wages | NBC Connecticut

Oh come on peoples, the wage already was increased to over $10.

[Mr_250]

Keep striking...they will be replaced with machines pretty soon anyway.

How a outs they strike and ask for something useful like money for a college education or trade skills. Nope... Those take work to achieve we'll just keep complaining.

[AnonChick]

It's pretty pathetic - and these strikers just aren't getting it. The higher the minimum wage, the fewer hours the boss will have available to give you. Rather than have to cover benefits - which cost the employer monty - he'll just hire a few dozen people and only give them 4-10 hours weekly at minimum wage, with zero chance of increase, no paid days off, no paid sick time, no paid anything, no possibility for overtime, and if you take your obligatory half-hour break, no possible chance of getting paid for it.

That's what's already happening in some places (like where I work now). Connecticut considers full time to be only 28 hours per week. So my employment will NOT hire anyone to work more than 20 hours per week. That way, even if someone gets called in for an extra shift, they don't stand a chance in hell over going over that 28 hour line and having to receive full-time benefits.

Good luck to all of us who are working part time jobs. I've already had my hours cut from a minimum of 12 per week, to a steady 4 hours per week. Per WEEK. Four hours. Per week. And they're hiring more people to ensure that NONE Of us go over 20 hours per week. The average weekly hours for my store are - wait for it - 7.

I don't expect to be able to live on part time wages. I do, however, expect for whatever hours I do work, to cover the weekly incidentals. A tank of gas once or twice a month (I get good mileage and don't drive far), and weekly groceries. I can't even buy groceries with this job.

Now that people are "demanding" higher minimum wages for crappy part time jobs, you should start expecting to see more of this. Expect to start seeing what used to be full time jobs with benefits, turn into part time jobs with zero benefits.

[Csiko]

Originally Posted by Mr_250

Keep striking...they will be replaced with machines pretty soon anyway.

How a outs they strike and ask for something useful like money for a college education or trade skills. Nope... Those take work to achieve we'll just keep complaining.

Pretty much this.

They've already been trying at one chain out west or down south, I forget which. A machine also is incapable of messing up your order for you.

Why should someone doing braindead work get paid $15 an hour? It's insanity. And the reality of the situation is that these high school kids won't ever get hired. You want $15 an hour? Better have a bachelor's degree in dishwashing.

[Tubeworm]

@AnonChick

Totally agree. My younger teenage friends are struggling to find seasonal jobs over the summer where they simply want to work to save money. The chain-stores and restaurants are only hiring employees on 10-20 hours per week, and if the employer has any suspicion that the employee is intending on working more hours per week, the application gets tossed. My sister told me that her friend applied to literally 30 different stores, and she got ONE call back for an 18 hour position, 2 days per week over the summer.

These strikers should be happy they even have jobs. I understand they can't live off of their 5-20 hour per week job, but if employers have to pay a higher minimum wage, they aren't going to be hiring anybody.

It's a legislative issue, but it's also an employer/employee issue-- screw the part-time employers/employees for making hell.

[AnonChick]

Originally Posted by Csiko

Pretty much this.

They've already been trying at one chain out west or down south, I forget which. A machine also is incapable of messing up your order for you.

Why should someone doing braindead work get paid $15 an hour? It's insanity. And the reality of the situation is that these high school kids won't ever get hired. You want $15 an hour? Better have a bachelor's degree in dishwashing.

It's not braindead work, if you're doing it right. Sadly, a lot of kids aren't taught how to do it right. In fact most kids have no idea how to even count change. They rely on the electronic cash register to tell them. And what's scary - if the total is $12.74, and you give them a 20, and they punch in $20 - and you rush to tell them "oh wait - I have 4 pennies" - they do NOT know what to do with that information. They can't handle the number-crunching in their heads that would tell them - so instead of 74 it's now 70, and I give them a quarter and a nickel instead of a quarter and a penny, along with the 2 singles and the 5."

They have no understanding of the counting involved in even that little simple task.

They also don't really understand customer service. They watch the videos, but it just doesn't click. It's a part time job, they don't care what the customer thinks, they don't care that the boss said no cell phones at the desk, they NEED their cell phones in case their VBFF calls to tell them about their ex-boyfriend's new girlfriend. They don't instill "service" to kids in school, and I have a feeling a lot of parents don't think it's something important to teach their kids either. So part time work is a "lower class" job, not deserving of their effort.

THAT is why it's a "no brainer" type of job. But if you want to be GOOD at it, it's not a no-brainer type of job. You need to be able to juggle a lot of things going on at the same time. You have to be attentive to the person at your register, while noticing the guy slinking down the aisle with a fistful of candy he just stole from the bin, at the same time acknowledging the presence of a pissed-off customer who just walked up and is demanding a refund or else she'll call the police and sue you (you, personally, of course) for fraud, while grabbing the phone because no one else is answering it and the ringing is driving you insane, while being able to count back that extra nickel to the customer and smile at her absolutely adorable special snowflake child who is vomiting in the shopping cart.

This isn't no-brainer work. It takes at least some basic intelligence, cleverness, a sense of humor, patience, maturity, sensitivity, and the kind of attention span that can be shattered into multiple directions without you losing track of what's going on, where, and with whom.

I feel it's definitely worth more than $7.35/hour, but I also feel that a lot of these fast food kids don't even try to do anything to EARN their pay, while some of us who are eager to do exactly that, aren't given the chance because the bosses have lowered their expectations.

[BPt111]

Seattle raises minimum wage to $15 an hour

[bobtn]

Originally Posted by Mr_250

Keep striking...they will be replaced with machines pretty soon anyway.

.

No doubt, Chilis and Applebees tablets today, fast food self-serve kiosks next year. Raising the wages will just increase the ROI of automating, and there are burger-flipping robots now. Corps are not spending mega-bucks developing them unless they expect to sell them.

[AnonChick]

Originally Posted by BPt111

Seattle raises minimum wage to $15 an hour

Yes, that's part of the impetus that's leading Connecticut burger-slingers to demand an increase as well. I think it's ridiculous in Seattle too. The more you get for minimum wage, the less chance you have to get any benefits, or decent hours, or raises. They can't raise the prices of things high enough to make up for the increase in salary and still have people willing to buy their burgers and fries - so they just reduce everything else that the employee USED to get, and no longer does.

[lizardtastic]

15/hour minimum wage is fantastic. Pay people a living wage