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"If they choose to work at minimum wage jobs for the entirety of their lives, then what have they done to deserve higher wages?"
there aren't any jobs in many places even with great credentials. Jeez Just because you were borne with a sliver spoon in your mouth have the decency to try and understand a bit will ya?
"If they choose to work at minimum wage jobs for the entirety of their lives, then what have they done to deserve higher wages?"
there aren't any jobs in many places even with great credentials. Jeez Just because you were borne with a sliver spoon in your mouth have the decency to try and understand a bit will ya?
I wasn't born with a silver spoon in my mouth. My first job, as a curb hand for a BBQ restaurant, was the day after I turned 14 and got a work permit from the local courthouse. If I wanted anything, I was expected to earn it. So, I got a job. I have never in the entirety of my life not been employed in some capacity, whether through someone else or myself. The work ethic I have may have been genetic, may have been taught by my parents or the jobs I have worked, or a bit of both. But, historically, in the United States of America, it is/was socially unacceptable to not pull your own weight. Somewhere along the way people have been taught to look for the handout first, and the work second.
If a person wants $15/hour, then they need to earn it. Making biscuits at Hardees and cutting deli meat at Wal-Mart is not the answer.
I resent this particular direction the country has taken. It defiles everything that every hard worker in America has ever achieved through his/her own persistence, determination, and luck.
Why should fast food workers, and others earning minimum wage, get paid $15/hour "just because?"
For one thing, because it would get them off food stamps (that I pay for) and make Wal-Mart's prices actually reflect the cost of the product they deliver, such as it is. Market economics are supposed to be a good thing, no?
As luck would have it, I have other choices - CostCo and Trader Joe's treat their people decently, and that would be worth something to me, even if it wasn't for the fact that they seem to be able to hire people who do try to make the experience of shopping less miserable.
The question is not whether a wage is sufficient to live on, but whether an entire industry of minimum wage workers deserve $15/hour "just because."
No one in their right mind believes that a Hardees biscuit maker deserves $15/hour. What these people deserve is an opportunity to achieve upward mobility. If they choose to work at minimum wage jobs for the entirety of their lives, then what have they done to deserve higher wages?
Wages are as much about achievement as they are market forces.
You're smart enough to decipher the difference, so why did you post this?
I actually thought my posting was rather clear, but I shall explain further.
The OP was making a rather hasty judgment, in my mind, based upon two incidences with service workers: one at Walmart, one at Hardees.The service the OP received was, he believed, not satisfactory (I shall ignore the possibility that he had, in fact, ordered chicken when he intended to order sausage).
“Why do they deserve a raise” indicates that the OP was maintaining that the workers he encountered that fateful morning do not ‘deserve’a raise in minimum wage (he did not specify $15 or any other figure) due to the poor service he said he received.
Of course, the OP was making a mistake that many fall into, especially here on CD: proclaiming that his two personal encounters represented the behavior of an entire class of several million people (here, minimum wage earners) and that decisions should be made on that person's unhappy transient experience.
Yet, if you look at the OP’s earlier postings (from 2012),he indicated that he was, at the least, sympathetic to the fact that the current minimum wage, or even wages higher than the minimum, were not sufficient for a single adult, much less a family. Since the OP is a young man (I assume so, since his postings indicate that he graduated from college in 2010) it may well be that in 2012 he had more recent experience working for the minimum wage, and hence more sympathetic.
Hence my question: if the OP’s encounters that fateful morning had been ‘positive’ would he then be creating a thread stating that ‘those people’ deserve a raise?
There are arguments to be made on raising the minimum wage, or keeping them the same (or even discarding the minimum). Such arguments should avoid being made on a personal, unsatisfactory, encounter with a single employee.
I went to Wal-Mart and Hardees this morning. I tried to get some deli meat at Wally World, and the clerk was very surly. Only one line was open, backed up with customers, and the cashier there was also very unfriendly. The Hardees was unclean and I ordered a chicken biscuit, and ended up with sausage. If these people can't do better than this, why do they deserve a raise?
Long lines? Blame management for not scheduling more workers.
Unclean restaurant? Blame management for not scheduling workers to clean it.
Last year i was in Costa Rica with some guys. One is a very successful farmer. He grew up on his dads 400 acre farm and his dad helped him get started. As the conversation went along we talked about poor people. He stated that the poor in Costa Rica had a lot less than those in the USA. He then stated well We all start out equal and we make our choices.
I have not ever known any farmer around this area that got started out on his own. Everyone of them had the family to help or married a farm or married money. Yes they all work very hard. Life is not always what you make it.
For one thing, because it would get them off food stamps (that I pay for) and make Wal-Mart's prices actually reflect the cost of the product they deliver, such as it is. As luck would have it, I have other choices - CostCo and Trader Joe's treat their people decently, and that would be worth something to me, even if it wasn't for the fact that they seem to be able to hire people who do try to make the experience of shopping less miserable.
Agreed! Why do we have to make up the slack that big business gets over with?
Long lines? Blame management for not scheduling more workers.
Unclean restaurant? Blame management for not scheduling workers to clean it.
Yes and no. Long lines need more workers, yes. As far as cleaning goes, if you're not helping a customer, then you are supposed to be cleaning. At least that's the philosophy that used to be employed by retail and restaurant outlets. My experience (decades ago) in these industries was such that if a manager (or God forbid the owner/corporate folks) was around and you didn't have a cleaning cloth and some spray in your hand, you were in danger of being dismissed if you weren't helping a customer.
That's the way it should be. The dumbing down of America has probably wiped that "policy" from the books long ago, though.
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