Thousands of Walmart employees are striking Thursday in cities across the United States, demanding better pay and protesting the firing of those who previously demonstrated against the company, the largest private employer in the country, with 1.3 million workers.
The strike comes just one week after fast-food workers staged walk-outs at fast-food restaurants in 60 U.S. cities to call for hourly pay of $15 instead of minimum wage, signaling a trend of worker unrest at non-union companies. According to strike organizers, many Walmart workers earn the minimum wage, which varies from state to state but typically hovers near $7 to $8 per hour.
In New York City, where demonstrations kicked off at 10 a.m., current and former Walmart workers protested along with advocacy and union groups. They were flanked by a band featuring a trumpet, trombone and saxophone, outside the office of Walmart board member Christopher Williams, CEO of Williams Capital Management.
Three protesters were arrested by the New York Police Department after sitting on the ground and locking arms in front of the building where Williams' office is located. They had been protesting outside the building with the aim of handing Williams a petition that organizers said had 200,000 signatures of people demanding Walmart commit to providing full-time work with a minimum salary of $25,000 and reinstate workers who were fired for previously striking.
Among those arrested Thursday was Barbara Gertz, an overnight stocker at the Walmart store in Aurora, Colorado. She told Al Jazeera that many workers were illegally penalized for striking in June outside Walmart's headquarters in Bentonville, Ark.
"When we went to Bentonville on strike in June, we wanted Walmart to hear our voices and to hear our concerns and not only did they not hear our voices, but when got back to our stores, many of us were retaliated against, were fired or we were written up and were harassed by management," Gertz said.
She said she and others want to see Walmart change its ways.
"We want them to change. We want them to start treating their associates fairly and give them the ability to support their families. When you get a full-time job, you get that to be able to have a house or home and support your family," she said. "You can't do that at Walmart."
According to a news release from the Organization United for Respect at Walmart (OUR Walmart) and the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, which back the strike, the workers are seeking a "wage floor" of $25,000 per year.
Strike organizers also charge that the company benefits from federal social-welfare programs by paying wages too low for workers to live on or by not providing health insurance, forcing employees to sign up for food stamps or Medicaid.
The organizations said the strikes follow Walmart's failure to meet a Sept. 1 deadline for reinstating employees fired for leading protests against the company. Strike organizers say that the firings violate U.S. labor law, which prevents reprisals from employers against workers who attempt to form a union.
"Rather than providing good jobs that American workers need and deserve, Walmart is trying to silence workers who are standing up with their co-workers to live better and spending its time and money trying to deny workers a decent day's pay," the press release said.
Walmart denies the labor organizers' charge that workers make minimum wage, saying that the average wage at the company is about $12 per hour, and that most employees work full-time and receive health insurance.
Kory Lundberg, a spokesperson for the company, said the workers allegedly fired for protesting the company were let go for attendance reasons.
"Many of these associates did not show up for work without any notice. It's pretty disrespectful to their co-workers, because it disrespects those who now have to pick up that extra work," Lundberg told Al Jazeera.
The release cites a congressional study finding that Walmart receives a government subsidy in the form of welfare for its workers, but Lundberg decried the report as "politically motivated" and subject to flawed methodology because it only examined one Walmart store in Wisconsin.
Other cities where Walmart employees are slated to strike on Thursday include Baton Rouge, La., Boston, Chicago, Cincinnati, Dallas, Denver, Los Angeles, Miami, Minneapolis, Orlando, Fla., Sacramento, Calif., San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, D.C. Thursday's action is expected to be the largest strike since Black Friday of 2012 which spanned at least nine cities, organizers said.
Among those arrested Thursday was Barbara Gertz, an overnight stocker at the Walmart store in Aurora, Colorado. She told Al Jazeera that many workers were illegally penalized for striking in June outside Walmart's headquarters in Bentonville, Ark.
Yeah, they are a US network now. They bought Current TV from Al Gore.
Also:
Strikes, strikes everywhere! Panic! It's almost like we still need Unions to balance out corporate power! Call in the Freikorps! Call in the Pinkertons!
"We want them to change. We want them to start treating their associates fairly and give them the ability to support their families. When you get a full-time job, you get that to be able to have a house or home and support your family," she said. "You can't do that at Walmart."
That's interesting...I had a full time job when I was 14. Guess that means the world owes me a house.
Pretty ridiculous...how about learning a more marketable skill? Oh no...too much work :(
You know. I hate walmart. This isnt like Mcdonalds, this is where they pay you so little they actually have welfare workers on their payroll to help people get on welfare, their own employees. They say "You earn this much a year" and then force you to work ridiculous hours.I refuse to give walmart any of my money.
"We want them to change. We want them to start treating their associates fairly and give them the ability to support their families. When you get a full-time job, you get that to be able to have a house or home and support your family," she said. "You can't do that at Walmart."
That's interesting...I had a full time job when I was 14. Guess that means the world owes me a house.
Pretty ridiculous...how about learning a more marketable skill? Oh no...too much work :(
Most labor laws prevent 14 year olds from having a full time job, where was it you worked and how many hours a week did you work? Note: Student doesn't count
Most labor laws prevent 14 year olds from having a full time job, where was it you worked and how many hours a week did you work? Note: Student doesn't count
When school is not in session, you can work 40 hours a week in most states.
Here is my state, MD:
Minors 14 and 15 years of age may not be employed or permitted to:
work more than 4 hours on any day when school is in session
work more than 8 hours a day on any day when school is not in session
work more than 23 hours in any week when school is in session
work more than 40 hours in any week when school is not in session
work before 7:00 a.m. or after 8:00 p.m. Minors may work until 9:00 p.m. from Memorial Day to Labor Day.
work more than 5 consecutive hours without a non-working period of at least 30 minutes.
So pretty much during the summer, you can work 'full time' and during the school year you can work 8 hours a day on weekends or 4 hours on weekdays.
I worked full-time at 14. Where is my free house?
25$ an hour for walmart unloader? We don't even pay EMTs, Teachers and Nurses that. Even entry level skilled jobs which require college degrees don't pay that. If you pay unskilled entry-level labor 25$ then all other salaries would have to be adjusted grossly upward to compensate. Hello super-inflation.
I use to work at the evil empire for a while. I remember, when I was there the minimum wage was increased (consider that). That essentially menat, after 6 months a new hire could be mnaking more than someone that had worked there over 23 months. The companies plan to address this? Nothing.
Every morning when I worked, I simply asked the managment what their plan was to address this situation? Every morning they said they were going to take no action. After a few days, other people started askign at othe rmeetings. We didn;t strike, were alsways polite, continues to work, and never argued with company policy. After asking the manager at every morning meeting I worked at for three months, they finally relented and gave us all raises to compensate for the Minimum Wage increase.
Nothing dramatic, I just kept up with the minimum wage increase, but it was an effective Labor vs. Management interaction that was successful and did not involve a strike or even threat of a strike.
However, that was a long time ago, and the covenant between worker and employer is very different now.
"We want them to change. We want them to start treating their associates fairly and give them the ability to support their families. When you get a full-time job, you get that to be able to have a house or home and support your family," she said. "You can't do that at Walmart."
That's interesting...I had a full time job when I was 14. Guess that means the world owes me a house.
Pretty ridiculous...how about learning a more marketable skill? Oh no...too much work :(
Most labor laws prevent 14 year olds from having a full time job, where was it you worked and how many hours a week did you work? Note: Student doesn't count
Sort of underhanded to assume that I'm lying. I worked at Baskin Robbins 5 days a week for money as a kid, and minimum wage back then wasn't nearly as good as it is now.
nkelsch wrote: I worked full-time at 14. Where is my free house?
Except that the quoted text didn't say that you should have a house. It said you get the full time job to be able to get the house. You still have to pay for it .
Sort of underhanded to assume that I'm lying. I worked at Baskin Robbins 5 days a week for money as a kid, and minimum wage back then wasn't nearly as good as it is now.
Did I call you a liar? I was honestly just curious.
As long as unemployment is this high, there is really no incentive for any employer to pay replaceable employees anything but the bare minimum. It's really a matter of labor supply and demand.
Clearly, the key here is to reduce supply or increase demand.
Ways to increase demand: support job creation programs, stop buying things from other countries, encourage US manufacturing.
Ways to decrease supply: reduce population. Eliminate the unemployed.
I don't like walmart - I had to get a prescription from them (out of convenience) and it was a painful 20 minute wait. I ate some Mcdonalds and then wandered around for the remaining 10 mins.
I'm torn as to whether the wages should be increased. There are many out there who deserve the wage increase, but just as many useless employees (like in any company) who contribute nothing.
gossipmeng wrote: I don't like walmart - I had to get a prescription from them (out of convenience) and it was a painful 20 minute wait. I ate some Mcdonalds and then wandered around for the remaining 10 mins.
I'm torn as to whether the wages should be increased. There are many out there who deserve the wage increase, but just as many useless employees (like in any company) who contribute nothing.
There is no easy fix...
No offense, but the word "deserve" has no place in this discussion. People make what people are worth. If an employee doesn't have a unique and competitive skill then he is not worth paying a unique and competitive salary.
I have to earn my paycheck, and I constantly have to prove my skillset to justify my pay. If someone can do my job for better, cheaper and faster, then I am on the street, as I should be.
If I want more income, I need to increase my value by working harder, working more efficiently or increasing my skillset.
feeder wrote: Can't wait for all the "retail isn't a career!' posts.
I imagine there will be some. It's all very well for people who do a job like this when they're young or going to college, before they go into something much better. They can sneer that it's 'not a career' so you shouldn't expect a fair wage. But for a lot of people, they won't get better than retail, they're just not able. This is what they can do, it's what they need to live on for life. That's why it should be a living wage instead of an exploitative one.
In the UK there's demand for a living wage, especially in London. But the real issue, the thing that puts the squeeze on everyone, is that housing is too expensive. House prices are just out of reach of normal people and rentals are too high, often because of people who have bought expensive properties to let. The solution is to radically tackle the housing market in a way that controls prices and prevents profiteering by a minority, and to bring in rent controls. I don't care if people squeal about capitalism and their need to make money, I think that people being able to afford a roof over their head is more important as a society than protecting an artificially inflated housing market. When you sort out housing, people's wages will be more liveable.
cincydooley wrote: You know what really undermines the article? The photo of the girl on the smartphone standing in the strike line.
Because you can't own a smartphone and work at walmart? Because owning a smartphone undermines your right to equal pay? Not sure what you're getting at here...
cincydooley wrote: You know what really undermines the article? The photo of the girl on the smartphone standing in the strike line.
Because you can't own a smartphone and work at walmart? Because owning a smartphone undermines your right to equal pay? Not sure what you're getting at here...
Because owning a smart phone has nothing to do with a living wage. In fact, I'd argue that if you're demanding a "living wage" a smart phone SHOULD NOT be included.
Among those arrested Thursday was Barbara Gertz, an overnight stocker at the Walmart store in Aurora, Colorado. She told Al Jazeera that many workers were illegally penalized for striking in June outside Walmart's headquarters in Bentonville, Ark.
Say again?
Aljazeera has opened up a smear of regional branches in the US, and a news channel. Its actually some of the most informative news out there. The absence of reporters sitting around a table babbling to each other is refreshing. They are a lot like the BBC in that aspect.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Easy E wrote: Yeah, they are a US network now. They bought Current TV from Al Gore.
Also:
Strikes, strikes everywhere! Panic! It's almost like we still need Unions to balance out corporate power! Call in the Freikorps! Call in the Pinkertons!
cincydooley wrote: Because owning a smart phone has nothing to do with a living wage. In fact, I'd argue that if you're demanding a "living wage" a smart phone SHOULD NOT be included.
What? That doesn't even make any sense. For one, how do you know she isn't there supporting a friend. For two, why does having a phone and/or internet exclude you from earning a living wage. In this day and age, cell service (and access to the internet) are pretty much required to function. Maybe she eschews cable, home phone and internet and saves money by just having a smart phone. You have no way of knowing and assuming is just asinine.
gossipmeng wrote: I don't like walmart - I had to get a prescription from them (out of convenience) and it was a painful 20 minute wait. I ate some Mcdonalds and then wandered around for the remaining 10 mins.
I'm torn as to whether the wages should be increased. There are many out there who deserve the wage increase, but just as many useless employees (like in any company) who contribute nothing.
There is no easy fix...
Was it a painful wait before or after you ate the McDonalds?
I am not a fan of Walmart since they went from "We have a store of 10 acres of American made crap" to "we have a store of 20 acres of foreign made crap." About two years ago they seemed to have decided to halve their workforce, and as a result I haven't darkened their door since.
gossipmeng wrote: I don't like walmart - I had to get a prescription from them (out of convenience) and it was a painful 20 minute wait. I ate some Mcdonalds and then wandered around for the remaining 10 mins.
I'm torn as to whether the wages should be increased. There are many out there who deserve the wage increase, but just as many useless employees (like in any company) who contribute nothing.
There is no easy fix...
No offense, but the word "deserve" has no place in this discussion. People make what people are worth. If an employee doesn't have a unique and competitive skill then he is not worth paying a unique and competitive salary.
on the flip side when the market is saturated with labor from Central America that will work - and gladly-for sub minimum wage, the argument that the deck has been stacked has merit.
Or more exactly, people get paid as little as their employer can get away with. There will always be people desperate enough to work for peanuts, it doesn't make it right to take advantage of that. In some countries people are paid pennies to work long days in factories. Is that all they are 'worth'? No, it's what the employer can get away with by exploiting their desperation for work and lack of alternatives. I'm not saying that Walmart is equivalent to a sweatshop, but the principle is the same. The hate for people striking is quite depressing, but unsurprising, chest-beating capitalism which excuses exploitation. If these people get a pay rise it means that you'll have to pay a bit more for that burger or whatever. It's not the end of the world and they don't all deserve to be sacked, or whatever else some suggest to quell their greedy and undeserved rebellion.
feeder wrote: Can't wait for all the "retail isn't a career!' posts.
I imagine there will be some. It's all very well for people who do a job like this when they're young or going to college, before they go into something much better. They can sneer that it's 'not a career' so you shouldn't expect a fair wage. But for a lot of people, they won't get better than retail, they're just not able. This is what they can do, it's what they need to live on for life. That's why it should be a living wage instead of an exploitative one.
In the UK there's demand for a living wage, especially in London. But the real issue, the thing that puts the squeeze on everyone, is that housing is too expensive. House prices are just out of reach of normal people and rentals are too high, often because of people who have bought expensive properties to let. The solution is to radically tackle the housing market in a way that controls prices and prevents profiteering by a minority, and to bring in rent controls. I don't care if people squeal about capitalism and their need to make money, I think that people being able to afford a roof over their head is more important as a society than protecting an artificially inflated housing market. When you sort out housing, people's wages will be more liveable.
Heaven forbid anybody buys land and rents it at a profit.
Salaried employees often work more than 40 hours per week. Perhaps employees in retail stores ought to consider doing the same if they cannot live on their pay working 40 hours per week? It's hard to sympathize with these people when I work a full time job, a part time job, and do consulting work on the side, then Uncle Sam dips into MY fething pockets to pay for other peoples' laziness.
feeder wrote: Can't wait for all the "retail isn't a career!' posts.
I imagine there will be some. It's all very well for people who do a job like this when they're young or going to college, before they go into something much better. They can sneer that it's 'not a career' so you shouldn't expect a fair wage. But for a lot of people, they won't get better than retail, they're just not able. This is what they can do, it's what they need to live on for life. That's why it should be a living wage instead of an exploitative one.
In the UK there's demand for a living wage, especially in London. But the real issue, the thing that puts the squeeze on everyone, is that housing is too expensive. House prices are just out of reach of normal people and rentals are too high, often because of people who have bought expensive properties to let. The solution is to radically tackle the housing market in a way that controls prices and prevents profiteering by a minority, and to bring in rent controls. I don't care if people squeal about capitalism and their need to make money, I think that people being able to afford a roof over their head is more important as a society than protecting an artificially inflated housing market. When you sort out housing, people's wages will be more liveable.
Heaven forbid anybody buys land and rents it at a profit.
Salaried employees often work more than 40 hours per week. Perhaps employees in retail stores ought to consider doing the same if they cannot live on their pay working 40 hours per week? It's hard to sympathize with these people when I work a full time job, a part time job, and do consulting work on the side, then Uncle Sam dips into MY fething pockets to pay for other peoples' laziness.
Most of us work full time, you're not a special flower. I however don't begrudge people in low paid retail work wanting a rise.
Or more exactly, people get paid as little as their employer can get away with. There will always be people desperate enough to work for peanuts, it doesn't make it right to take advantage of that. In some countries people are paid pennies to work long days in factories. Is that all they are 'worth'? No, it's what the employer can get away with by exploiting their desperation for work and lack of alternatives. I'm not saying that Walmart is equivalent to a sweatshop, but the principle is the same. The hate for people striking is quite depressing, but unsurprising, chest-beating capitalism which excuses exploitation. If these people get a pay rise it means that you'll have to pay a bit more for that burger or whatever. It's not the end of the world and they don't all deserve to be sacked, or whatever else some suggest to quell their greedy and undeserved rebellion.
If they have no unique and competitive skills to offer, then why should they be paid unique and competitive salaries? I'd also like to add that your point may apply to retail stores, but it certainly does not apply to employee-owned companies and private enterprises. My point remains - if they don't like the amount of money they make in a 40 hour work week, then they need to find a second job.
You seem to be complaining about the unfairness of the government's approach to taxing working hours in multiple jobs, and then lashing out at people earning more doing just one job. Direct your anger at the right thing instead of being upset that people in retail want better wages.
I made a similar point on the other thread, people are too keen to attack other workers they see getting a wage rise because it's 'unfair' instead of attacking the system holding everyone back. Corporations and government screw over the masses, but somehow they've convinced the masses to hate on each other when any appear to get a sniff of an advantage, rather than showing any unity against an unfair system and supporting each other in seeking a living wage.
cincydooley wrote: Because owning a smart phone has nothing to do with a living wage. In fact, I'd argue that if you're demanding a "living wage" a smart phone SHOULD NOT be included.
What? That doesn't even make any sense. For one, how do you know she isn't there supporting a friend. For two, why does having a phone and/or internet exclude you from earning a living wage. In this day and age, cell service (and access to the internet) are pretty much required to function. Maybe she eschews cable, home phone and internet and saves money by just having a smart phone. You have no way of knowing and assuming is just asinine.
It's clear we disagree heavily on this, so I really won't go into it anymore.
If you're struggle to earn a 'livable wage' it's my opinion that your priorties are in the wrong place if you have a smart phone. It's a luxury item.
And you're right, I have no way of knowing if the chick with the smart phone actually works at Wal Mart or is just there supporting a friend.
Either way, I don't feel a shred of sympathy for them.
cincydooley wrote: If you're struggle to earn a 'livable wage' it's my opinion that your priorties are in the wrong place if you have a smart phone. It's a luxury item.
Smart/cell phones used to be luxury items. That is no longer true. You can get a smart phone with data and voice for less than you could get those same things separately (internet and voice) for your home. Considering that a phone is required for more people to function and internet is almost required to get a job at this point, that is no longer a luxury.
cincydooley wrote: Because owning a smart phone has nothing to do with a living wage. In fact, I'd argue that if you're demanding a "living wage" a smart phone SHOULD NOT be included.
What? That doesn't even make any sense. For one, how do you know she isn't there supporting a friend. For two, why does having a phone and/or internet exclude you from earning a living wage. In this day and age, cell service (and access to the internet) are pretty much required to function. Maybe she eschews cable, home phone and internet and saves money by just having a smart phone. You have no way of knowing and assuming is just asinine.
It's clear we disagree heavily on this, so I really won't go into it anymore.
If you're struggle to earn a 'livable wage' it's my opinion that your priorties are in the wrong place if you have a smart phone. It's a luxury item.
And you're right, I have no way of knowing if the chick with the smart phone actually works at Wal Mart or is just there supporting a friend.
Either way, I don't feel a shred of sympathy for them.
They should let us in to their house! God forbid they have furniture as well
I wish these guys the best of luck with their striking, although I think unemployment is still sufficiently high that it won't go well. Walmart has shown itself to be essentially immune to bad press about how poorly it's workers are treated, after all.
cincydooley wrote: You know what really undermines the article? The photo of the girl on the smartphone standing in the strike line.
The serfs have too much bread!
Seriously though, what an outlandish argument you have made here. You can get a free Iphone 4 os Samsung GS3 with new service from Sprint; and that's the only carrier I cared to check. Find a better way to heap opprobrium on entry level workers for the crime of getting uppity next time.
cincydooley wrote: You know what really undermines the article? The photo of the girl on the smartphone standing in the strike line.
Because you can't own a smartphone and work at walmart? Because owning a smartphone undermines your right to equal pay? Not sure what you're getting at here...
'Right to equal pay'? Equal to whom? What defines 'equal'? A government controlled wage that all jobs regardless of skill, effort or quality work output get?
If Costco pays more and has better benefits... go work at Costco. If Walmart is trying to target the bottom of the workforce, then they are getting paid what they are worth. If you feel you have better skills and work ethic to justify more, then go elsewhere with your skills and work ethic.
$10 for an unimpressive but functional phone, no contract.
T-mobile has a plan that gives 100 minutes talk and unlimited internet for $30/month. You need more minutes, you buy them at $0.10 each. No contract. Can't afford your phone for a month? Don't pay for it until you can.
Assuming you don't have any home based internet, this is an amazing idea and probably how I would do it if I ever found myself in that situation.
But more to the point. My wife is a teacher. In order for her to get paid more (since they've been on a pay freeze for 5 years) she has to get her masters. She has to further her education and skill set. For lack of a better phrase, she has to earn it by showing herself more valuable to the district.
That's not what these people are doing. They feel like they're entitled to more. Why? What happened to the whole, earn it by making yourself more valuable mentality?
But is a phone period? Can you get a cheaper land line phone than that?
But more to the point. My wife is a teacher. In order for her to get paid more (since they've been on a pay freeze for 5 years) she has to get her masters. She has to further her education and skill set. For lack of a better phrase, she has to earn it by showing herself more valuable to the district.
That's not what these people are doing. They feel like they're entitled to more. Why? What happened to the whole, earn it by making yourself more valuable mentality?
There could be the premise that they don't suddenly deserve more, but that they are finally demanding they get what they should be paid for their efforts. Without personally agreeing or disagreeing with that, I will say that they, like the fast food guys, certainly will know how much their labor is worth based upon Wal-Mart's response.
I know we can get a land Line for $10 a month. We don't have one, but that's what it would cost. I think it's like, $14 a month with digital voicemail.
They get paid for their efforts. I just happen to think their efforts are worth exactly minimum wage for the unskilled labor they provide.
As a bona fide trade unionist who works in a factory with an ongoing labour dispute...good on 'em. Minimum wage in America is fething awful, it's about half what they earn here.
I am not a raving revolutionary but I support workers when they need it, and these guys have my full sympathy.
Howard A Treesong wrote: You seem to be complaining about the unfairness of the government's approach to taxing working hours in multiple jobs, and then lashing out at people earning more doing just one job. Direct your anger at the right thing instead of being upset that people in retail want better wages.
I made a similar point on the other thread, people are too keen to attack other workers they see getting a wage rise because it's 'unfair' instead of attacking the system holding everyone back. Corporations and government screw over the masses, but somehow they've convinced the masses to hate on each other when any appear to get a sniff of an advantage, rather than showing any unity against an unfair system and supporting each other in seeking a living wage.
I love this post.
Its pretty much my exact thoughts.
I feel this way every time people get upset at teachers for their salaries and wages and benefits that the UNION fights for
Or more exactly, people get paid as little as their employer can get away with. There will always be people desperate enough to work for peanuts, it doesn't make it right to take advantage of that. In some countries people are paid pennies to work long days in factories. Is that all they are 'worth'? No, it's what the employer can get away with by exploiting their desperation for work and lack of alternatives. I'm not saying that Walmart is equivalent to a sweatshop, but the principle is the same. The hate for people striking is quite depressing, but unsurprising, chest-beating capitalism which excuses exploitation. If these people get a pay rise it means that you'll have to pay a bit more for that burger or whatever. It's not the end of the world and they don't all deserve to be sacked, or whatever else some suggest to quell their greedy and undeserved rebellion.
If they have no unique and competitive skills to offer, then why should they be paid unique and competitive salaries? I'd also like to add that your point may apply to retail stores, but it certainly does not apply to employee-owned companies and private enterprises. My point remains - if they don't like the amount of money they make in a 40 hour work week, then they need to find a second job.
You know some people work to live, not live to work. Doing too many hours? get your outgoings down.
cincydooley wrote: I know we can get a land Line for $10 a month. We don't have one, but that's what it would cost. I think it's like, $14 a month with digital voicemail.
They get paid for their efforts. I just happen to think their efforts are worth exactly minimum wage for the unskilled labor they provide.
That depends where you live, I guess. The last time we had a land line was more than a decade ago in Oakland, a land line with no extra function whatsoever (we just wanted to be able to dial 911 and be reasonably sure to get through), and it was more than that.
Howard A Treesong wrote: But the real issue, the thing that puts the squeeze on everyone, is that housing is too expensive. House prices are just out of reach of normal people and rentals are too high,
You're not kidding, the average price for a house in London is coming on for £500k
You'd have to make mortgage payments of £3.5k per month, as well as pony up about £50k as a deposit.
Who can do that?
Certainly not me, and I'm fairly well paid.
I know I'm probably in a minority, but having a job doesn't mean being able to buy/rent a house, at least to me.
People seem to insist that they get to live where they want, on whatever wages they get. But, if I couldn't afford to live alone, I get a place with a mate. I thought that was how it has always worked.
Co-habiting sorts out the lack of affordable housing 'issue', excessive energy bills, and low-wages 'problems', all at once.
So, if they insist that wages must be at least enough to get a place of their own, they've not got my support.
Wages paid out must be based on takings coming in, and to put up wages, prices must go up, too. That makes living costs rise, and you're back wanting more wages.....
FWIW, I don't earn enough to get a place on my own, but with my wife's wages, we can afford a fairly OK place.
Housing prices being high is the opposite side of the issue that causes wages to be low.
Too many humans.
Supply & Demand. Too many people means labor supply is greater than demand, driving wages down, while too many people means demand for places to put them is greater than the supply of places.
Skinnereal wrote: I know I'm probably in a minority, but having a job doesn't mean being able to buy/rent a house, at least to me.
Two adults in full time employment should be able to afford to buy somewhere live though.
The problem is that house prices are too high compared to wages.
Sadly it costs a house builder about the same to build a 100k house as a 300k house, so if you're a house builder, what do you do?
You build the 300k house.
Void__Dragon wrote: Speaking as a Walmart unloader, I certainly would not mind being paid way more money.
I'd say about 25 dollars an hour is fair.
I Joined the Navy, served my country got a degree, got hired at a major bank coproation, I am a programmer who makes 20 dollars an hour, i've personally saved the company over a million a year in automation.
So a Walmart unloader should make more than me? By the logic of the strikers I need to get paid 100 dollars an hour.
Won't you get fired for striking or is Walmart a Union?
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Redbeard wrote: Housing prices being high is the opposite side of the issue that causes wages to be low.
Too many humans.
Supply & Demand. Too many people means labor supply is greater than demand, driving wages down, while too many people means demand for places to put them is greater than the supply of places.
The real problem is people wanting to be entitled to more money without having to work for it.
cincydooley wrote: You know what really undermines the article? The photo of the girl on the smartphone standing in the strike line.
Because you can't own a smartphone and work at walmart? Because owning a smartphone undermines your right to equal pay? Not sure what you're getting at here...
'Right to equal pay'? Equal to whom? What defines 'equal'? A government controlled wage that all jobs regardless of skill, effort or quality work output get?
If Costco pays more and has better benefits... go work at Costco. If Walmart is trying to target the bottom of the workforce, then they are getting paid what they are worth. If you feel you have better skills and work ethic to justify more, then go elsewhere with your skills and work ethic.
I Joined the Navy, served my country got a degree, got hired at a major bank coproation, I am a programmer who makes 20 dollars an hour, i've personally saved the company over a million a year in automation.
So a Walmart unloader should make more than me? By the logic of the strikers I need to get paid 100 dollars an hour.
To be fair, you're not really making much for being a programmer. I know guys who made that at entry level doing programming in STL. Hell, I think I bumped up to 42k after my 90 day probation period as an entry level software support guy.
So they can gather inaccurate data, then exaggerate it massively, causing Wal-mart execs to be paralysed into uselessness thinking that those sticks really are cannons?
Aren't they owned by the Swedish now? I doubt they'd go back to their anti-union bust some heads attitudes if so now.
I Joined the Navy, served my country got a degree, got hired at a major bank coproation, I am a programmer who makes 20 dollars an hour, i've personally saved the company over a million a year in automation.
So a Walmart unloader should make more than me? By the logic of the strikers I need to get paid 100 dollars an hour.
To be fair, you're not really making much for being a programmer. I know guys who made that at entry level doing programming in STL. Hell, I think I bumped up to 42k after my 90 day probation period as an entry level software support guy.
Are you in a low cost of living area?
Not really, I'm in Gilbert Arizona which is really nice, but I have a pretty easy job so I'm OK with the 20 dollars an hour.
Started my own software company last month, so I'll supplement my I WANT TO GET PAID MORE dreams that way.
Among those arrested Thursday was Barbara Gertz, an overnight stocker at the Walmart store in Aurora, Colorado. She told Al Jazeera that many workers were illegally penalized for striking in June outside Walmart's headquarters in Bentonville, Ark.
Say again?
Aljazeera has opened up a smear of regional branches in the US, and a news channel. Its actually some of the most informative news out there. The absence of reporters sitting around a table babbling to each other is refreshing. They are a lot like the BBC in that aspect.
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Easy E wrote: Yeah, they are a US network now. They bought Current TV from Al Gore.
Also:
Strikes, strikes everywhere! Panic! It's almost like we still need Unions to balance out corporate power! Call in the Freikorps! Call in the Pinkertons!
I bet the preppers didn't see this one coming...
Actually, yup we did
Birth pangs of economic strife....rampant strikes. As more people are un/under-employed, more people are available to strike/protest, and the more people protesting, the more likely chance violence will ensue.
I work 3 jobs. Two are computer related (one full time, one side business whenever, usually late, late at night), and a part time job at a gun store. I have Sunday's off and thats about it.
You know some people work to live, not live to work. Doing too many hours? get your outgoings down.
That's a cute expression, but it doesn't really offer anything academic to the current argument.
My point is that responsible people who think to themselves, "I'm not making enough money" will go out and find new jobs or get second jobs, NOT stamp their feet and demand better pay. This is an exceptionally poor idea when an employee is as replaceable as a Wendy's burger flipper.
You know some people work to live, not live to work. Doing too many hours? get your outgoings down.
That's a cute expression, but it doesn't really offer anything academic to the current argument.
Actually, he has a very good point. If you reduce your expenses, you CAN afford to work less, or for less. I used to barely break even, and by cutting back on expenditures and paying off debt as soon as possible, I'm now in the black.
Hell, at this point, I could work 20 hours a week at my current pay (or 40 at half pay) and still make ends meet.
pities2004 wrote:
The real problem is people wanting to be entitled to more money without having to work for it.
I think you're dead wrong about this. No one who is striking is looking for money without work. What they want is reasonable compensation, a living wage for a doing a day's work.
Sure, they want more than classical economics says they should have, because economics has no soul and teaches people that they should all be self-serving bastards and put their own interest first.
However, Walmart could double the wages of every employee working there and Alice Walton and the other heirs would still be in the Forbes list. Just because Walmart can get away with paying people minimum wage and growing their private pile of gold doesn't mean that's fair or right. To be honest, I'd happily bet that any Walmart employee actually works harder in a day than Alice Walton does in a month.
It's not about wanting money without working. It's about wanting a system that doesn't favour a very small handful of people being able to accumulate all the wealth at the expense of the vast majority.
And yes, it's about the system. Walmart couldn't get away with paying their rock-bottom wages if the government didn't pick up the slack and make sure their employees could actually afford to eat with food stamps. Explain to me why my taxes should be subsidizing the pockets of the richest family in the country? Who is really feeling entitled to more money without working, the guy who works 38 hours/week because god-forbid he be considered full-time and get benefits, or Alice Walton?
pities2004 wrote:
The real problem is people wanting to be entitled to more money without having to work for it.
I think you're dead wrong about this. No one who is striking is looking for money without work. What they want is reasonable compensation, a living wage for a doing a day's work.
Sure, they want more than classical economics says they should have, because economics has no soul and teaches people that they should all be self-serving bastards and put their own interest first.
However, Walmart could double the wages of every employee working there and Alice Walton and the other heirs would still be in the Forbes list. Just because Walmart can get away with paying people minimum wage and growing their private pile of gold doesn't mean that's fair or right. To be honest, I'd happily bet that any Walmart employee actually works harder in a day than Alice Walton does in a month.
It's not about wanting money without working. It's about wanting a system that doesn't favour a very small handful of people being able to accumulate all the wealth at the expense of the vast majority.
And yes, it's about the system. Walmart couldn't get away with paying their rock-bottom wages if the government didn't pick up the slack and make sure their employees could actually afford to eat with food stamps. Explain to me why my taxes should be subsidizing the pockets of the richest family in the country? Who is really feeling entitled to more money without working, the guy who works 38 hours/week because god-forbid he be considered full-time and get benefits, or Alice Walton?
Why should a walmart worker be making more or the same as a teacher?
pities2004 wrote: Why should a walmart worker be making more or the same as a teacher?
Why should a teacher be making so little in the first place?
ding ding ding!
Also public school teachers get their federal loans repaid after... 15 years (at most) in the public school systems. Too bad they also have to make payments on their loans as they're doing this to qualify...
pities2004 wrote: Why should a walmart worker be making more or the same as a teacher?
Why should a teacher be making so little in the first place?
Its not "so little", it is what the market as a whole as deemed his salary should be.
No, teachers make jack gak. If I were a teacher right now I'd be making about 7 thousand dollars less than I do now. I'm currently living with my parents, paying some in rent, and not having to buy food... I still barely make ends meet.
No, teachers make jack gak. If I were a teacher right now I'd be making about 7 thousand dollars less than I do now. I'm currently living with my parents, paying some in rent, and not having to buy food... I still barely make ends meet.
You don't have to pay rent or food or things like electricity, water, cable, internet, what kind of "ends meet" are you talking about?
I think you're dead wrong about this. No one who is striking is looking for money without work. What they want is reasonable compensation, a living wage for a doing a day's work.
Sure, they want more than classical economics says they should have, because economics has no soul and teaches people that they should all be self-serving bastards and put their own interest first.
However, Walmart could double the wages of every employee working there and Alice Walton and the other heirs would still be in the Forbes list. Just because Walmart can get away with paying people minimum wage and growing their private pile of gold doesn't mean that's fair or right. To be honest, I'd happily bet that any Walmart employee actually works harder in a day than Alice Walton does in a month.
It's not about wanting money without working. It's about wanting a system that doesn't favour a very small handful of people being able to accumulate all the wealth at the expense of the vast majority.
And yes, it's about the system. Walmart couldn't get away with paying their rock-bottom wages if the government didn't pick up the slack and make sure their employees could actually afford to eat with food stamps. Explain to me why my taxes should be subsidizing the pockets of the richest family in the country? Who is really feeling entitled to more money without working, the guy who works 38 hours/week because god-forbid he be considered full-time and get benefits, or Alice Walton?
No, teachers make jack gak. If I were a teacher right now I'd be making about 7 thousand dollars less than I do now. I'm currently living with my parents, paying some in rent, and not having to buy food... I still barely make ends meet.
You don't have to pay rent or food or things like electricity, water, cable, internet, what kind of "ends meet" are you talking about?
I'm guessing college loans, transportation, health care, etc.
No, teachers make jack gak. If I were a teacher right now I'd be making about 7 thousand dollars less than I do now. I'm currently living with my parents, paying some in rent, and not having to buy food... I still barely make ends meet.
You don't have to pay rent or food or things like electricity, water, cable, internet, what kind of "ends meet" are you talking about?
Student loans on student loans on student loans.
I've stated this before on these forums. I pay for my family's 3 cell phones (since my work gives an employee discount), I pay for my car, plus 80 dollars a week in gas driving too and from work, close to a thousand dollars a month in student loan bills, insurance, and medical insurance (but that gets taken out of my paycheck before I get it). By barely making my ends meet, I mean I have about 200 bucks a month if I'm lucky, half of that gets put into savings, and half of that goes to the, "keep Alf sane", fund.
Note: I went to college to be a teacher, I know exactly how little they make...
pities2004 wrote: Why should a walmart worker be making more or the same as a teacher?
Well, that's an interesting question.
First, why do you need to compare these two? Walmart is a private entity, while teaching is largely a government job. As such, teachers are paid on the public dime, while Walmart employees are paid on Walmart's dime. Walmart clearly has the funds to pay their workers more, and only gets away with paying them what they do because the rules that govern the market allow for them to pay poverty-level wages without concern for how their employees manage to eat. As noted before, Walmart could very easily pay their employees double what they do now, with no change to anything except, possibly, dropping Alice Walton from 3rd to 5th on the Richest People in the World list.
On the other hand, teachers, being paid on the public dime, don't have this sort of economic issue. Teachers are paid out of taxes levied on communities. Want teachers to make more, well, that money has to come from somewhere, and that somewhere is increased taxes. Taxes go up either as rate hikes, or as a result of everyone else's wages going up (the "growing the base" / Rising Tide approach). So, why are teachers not making a lot? Because everyone isn't making a lot. Raise minimum wage, and all other wages will go up as a result. We've seen this in the past. Private sector wages will increase in order to retain the higher-quality talent, and public sector wages will go up because the base will have grown and the funds will be available.
I think a lot of our current state can be traced back to the proven failure of Reaganomics and "trickle-down" economics. It's a great sound bite, but economics doesn't work like that, especially not in a consumer economy. Our economy is driven by spending, and people without money don't spend. People with money do, and that powers the engine that makes it all work. Wealth doesn't "trickle down", it cycles upwards. And there are any number of statistics and charts and graphs that show what's happened since trickle-down started that show that the result is greater income inequality.
There was a great article a couple of years back by one of the 1%ers, who basically laid it out. If you give everyone in the bottom 50% of the income scale in this country an extra $1000, they'll all spend it. That $1000 will change hands multiple times, and power our economy, based on trade. But, if you give that same $1000 to the wealthy, it just turns into a number in a bank account.
That's what's so wrong with the conservative approach to the economy right now. They're so concerned about the people who will be "entitled", who will get something for nothing (and very few people are actually doing nothing), that this ideology is preventing an economic recovery. Instead, we're seeing record stock markets, putting more zeros in the bank accounts of the already-rich, but little help for the majority of people who would actually spend cash.
Our economy isn't helped by Alice Walton sitting on the Forbes list. She cannot spend the money she has. Her employees would spend it. And we'd all be better off as a result. But, sure, "those people" don't deserve to earn a living wage.
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Kilkrazy wrote: All the arguing about what they should or should not get is meaningless. If the strike succeeds, they will get a pay rise.
The strike cannot succeed. There are too many unemployed who would gladly take the job as even poverty-level wages are better than nothing. The strikes are more about drawing attention to the issue than they are about getting resolution. At the moment, the rules simply favour the big businesses who can replace the small cogs rather than paying them more.
Note: I went to college to be a teacher, I know exactly how little they make...
Teachers in my area make more annually in 10 months than their 12 month 4-year degree professional office job alternatives. They start here at 41k where entry level business people barley make 35k. Also, Teachers get their masters for Freeeeeee and after their masters +60 can max out well over 100k a year (for 10 months of work). And after 30 years, they get health benefits and 60% of their annual income in retirement. Something working stiffs get none of.
Leaving teaching to chase down the 'money' of the tech world because all I could see was dollar signs, You fail to realize how much teachers really do make and how much better off they are than the rest of the population.
And if you wanted to be a teacher, you should have gone to community college, worked through school and kept your debt low because once employed and you get your masters, your college degree basically is 'overwritten' with the school you get your masters from for all purposes. Who ever thought they should be entitled to dicking around for 4-6 years and then get an education and then cry about money? I worked all through college and graduated with zero debt.
daedalus wrote: It's an interesting culture we've been sold: "Meritocracy for the poor"
What are you trying to say here?
I believe he is trying to say that we've sold this idea that if you work hard, your hard work will be rewarded...
Ahh, didn't quite come out that way. Gotcha though.
It isn't really true, but I agree that that is what we've been sold. It is, after all, the American Dream. Work hard and you will prosper. In a lot of places, that simply isn't true.
You know some people work to live, not live to work. Doing too many hours? get your outgoings down.
That's a cute expression, but it doesn't really offer anything academic to the current argument.
Actually, he has a very good point. If you reduce your expenses, you CAN afford to work less, or for less. I used to barely break even, and by cutting back on expenditures and paying off debt as soon as possible, I'm now in the black.
Hell, at this point, I could work 20 hours a week at my current pay (or 40 at half pay) and still make ends meet.
Doesn't mean I WANT to, but I could.
Apologies to loki old fart, I misinterpreted his post. Sorry about that.
Note: I went to college to be a teacher, I know exactly how little they make...
Teachers in my area make more annually in 10 months than their 12 month 4-year degree professional office job alternatives. They start here at 41k where entry level business people barley make 35k. Also, Teachers get their masters for Freeeeeee and after their masters +60 can max out well over 100k a year (for 10 months of work). And after 30 years, they get health benefits and 60% of their annual income in retirement. Something working stiffs get none of.
Leaving teaching to chase down the 'money' of the tech world because all I could see was dollar signs, You fail to realize how much teachers really do make and how much better off they are than the rest of the population.
And if you wanted to be a teacher, you should have gone to community college, worked through school and kept your debt low because once employed and you get your masters, your college degree basically is 'overwritten' with the school you get your masters from for all purposes. Who ever thought they should be entitled to dicking around for 4-6 years and then get an education and then cry about money? I worked all through college and graduated with zero debt.
A teacher that has been working for more than a few years makes plenty of money, I know exactly about all of the perks, but I was not and am not in a position where teaching is a viable way to support myself. I spent my time immediately after college looking for a job in the tech world and the teaching world, and as I approached the, "hey your loans are coming up for repayment" portion I had to find a job and find a job fast.
There are a lot of could haves I could have done, but when I started out in college, the university I went to made it extremely lucrative to go their my freshman year. I owed the school 4 grand which I paid off my first year by working. I continued to work through years 2 through 5, but grades suffered year two and three, so they took my scholarships, and then my family started to make a little bit too much money so I couldn't get as much aid as I had gotten in previous years. My final year I took out more loans than I did in the first three years combined. I could have done it better, but I didn't. I am living with that fact right now. I'd love to live on my own, I'd love to provide for myself, but it's not possible at the moment without doing things like moving home. And to assume that I dicked around for 4 to 6 years is extremely disingenuous. I worked my fething ass off to pay for a school that was over costed and lied to my face about my program and the window in which I could graduate. They said 4 years, I did the math upon the close of my first senior year and even if I didn't drop the class I was struggling in freshman year, the earliest I could have graduated was half way through my second senior year. My final semester I required only 1 actual class to graduate, and they don't let you do your final course work at satellite schools.
The college system in our country is fethed up beyond belief.
Edit: For what it's worth, I still have plans to go into teaching, just probably not for the next 4 years or so until I get a few things paid off...
I'm in favour of a raise to minimum wage and getting rid of loopholes that allow employers to work someone 39.5 hours. I think anyone who works full time, regardless of how "lowly" their job may seem, deserves to earn a living wage. While I doubt this will happen, I favour a return to a 1960's level (inflation adjusted) minimum wage and tax rates, even though in the short-term, this would probably affect me negatively (I'd have to pay more taxes, and it would take a few years before the real economic engine gains would be realized).
I believe we've been sold a false hope ("trickle-down economics") that has proven to do nothing but line the pockets of the already wealthy, and believe we'd all be better off returning to a pre-Reagan economic model. I believe this would also require an adjustment to the corporate culture that says the corporate responsibility is solely to the stockholder (another 80'sism that provides questionable moral justification for poor corporate citizenship). Prior to this, corporations typically took responsibility for their employees and their communities, as well as their shareholders. (I read a good article on this recently, but can't remember where).
Note: I went to college to be a teacher, I know exactly how little they make...
Teachers in my area make more annually in 10 months than their 12 month 4-year degree professional office job alternatives. They start here at 41k where entry level business people barley make 35k. Also, Teachers get their masters for Freeeeeee and after their masters +60 can max out well over 100k a year (for 10 months of work). And after 30 years, they get health benefits and 60% of their annual income in retirement. Something working stiffs get none of.
Leaving teaching to chase down the 'money' of the tech world because all I could see was dollar signs, You fail to realize how much teachers really do make and how much better off they are than the rest of the population.
And if you wanted to be a teacher, you should have gone to community college, worked through school and kept your debt low because once employed and you get your masters, your college degree basically is 'overwritten' with the school you get your masters from for all purposes. Who ever thought they should be entitled to dicking around for 4-6 years and then get an education and then cry about money? I worked all through college and graduated with zero debt.
Where the hell do you live? Those numbers seem awfully...high. And there are still district that are paying for teachers to get their masters? Man, we really need to move there. I'd actually get to spend a bonus or some of our tax return.
And community colleges with education programs? We must just not be living in the right state, alf, because I know in Cincy/Dayton there aren't any CCs that have an accredited education program.
Additionally, your whole "10 months of work" claim is a complete fallacy in regards to any teacher that is actually good at their job. It's a little insulting, actually. But that's the general attitude in the States towards teachers, so it isn't wholly unexpected.
The Community College route in Ohio is a completely valid, and undersold, and often lied about (i.e. universities often lie about how bad of an idea it is).
In ohio, any state school must accept community college credit. So you spend 2 years getting all of your core classes done, and then transfer to a school with an education program and graduate in 1 to 2 years. Bam save money.
Community college is an excellent path for your gen-eds, especially returning students. My wife went back to school a few years ago. My salary precluded us from getting any sort of grants or scholarship (she gets a 4.0, but we're white and well-off, so not "in need"), and we didn't want to be stuck with loans, so she did all her gen-eds at the local community college.
She still says it was a good choice for re-learning study skills and a good experience, and we saved about $20k on the final college bill as well. You still graduate and get your degree from wherever you transfer to, and no one, ever, will ask you where you took English 101.
Generally, you seek work that hopefully
1.) You like
2.) Pays what you think you are worth
If those two things cant be met in your area, the age old tradition was to move to where you could find something that met those two criteria. Or you just worked your butt off to make the $$ you want.
I left a very lucrative area/industry for a more rural existence. I am happier now, making about 1/2 what I used to make. Yes I work 3 jobs, but that's because I chose to live where I live, and I like my 3 jobs. I get paid gak at the gun store, but I get things at cost, and I get 10% of internet sales that I post.
If Walmart isnt paying enough, then leave for someone else who is.
One simply cannot have a discussion about Walmart's wages without someone bringing up Costco. It seems to be de rigeur, like tipping your waiter, calling your mother on her birthday, and never starting your thank you notes with the words "Thank you". So lets get it out of the way before the supper gong goes.
Obviously, there's a pretty pleasing narrative for labor activists:
A Sam's Club employee starts at $10 and makes $12.50 after four and a half years. A new Costco employee, at $11 an hour, doesn't start out much better, but after four and a half years she makes $19.50 an hour. In addition to this, she receives something called an "extra check"—a bonus of more than $2,000 every six months. A cashier at Costco, after five years, makes about $40,000 a year. Health benefits are among the best in the industry, with workers paying only about 12 percent of their premiums out-of-pocket while Wal-Mart workers pay more than 40 percent.
In response to this post, Matt Yglesias says that Costco's margins are lower than Walmart's, so pretty clearly, there's room for them to lower the margins and give the money to the workers. Quite possibly so, but I'm not actually sure how well this argument really works. It would be a good argument in the case of, say, steel plants or automakers, where the business models are all about the same. But Walmart is not just a poor man's Costco. They're very different businesses, with very different labor models, demographics, and revenue streams. And those things work together: the fact that Costco is doing great with a given labor model or profit margin does not therefore mean that Walmart could easily follow the same course. With depressing regularity, you see pundits and activists asking "Why can't Walmart be more like Costco", which is a little like asking why Malcolm Gladwell can't be more like Michael Jordan. I mean . . . um . . . where do I even start?
How about with some basic figures about Costco and Walmart? I, er, just happen to have a handy little table right here. Just something I threw together, you know. No trouble at all.
What do you notice? Costco has a more highly paid labor force--but that labor force also brings in a lot more money. Costco's labor force, paid $19 an hour, brings in three times as much revenue as a Walmart workforce paid somewhere between 50-60% of that. (There's a bit of messiness to all these calculations, because of course both firms have employees who don't work in stores--but that's the majority of their workforce, so I'm going to assume that the differences come out in the wash.)
This is not because Costco treats its workers better, and therefore gets fantastic productivity out of them, though this is what you would think if you listened to very sincere union activists on NPR. Rather, it's because their business model is inherently higher-productivity. A typical Costco store has around 4,000 SKUs, most of which are stacked on pallets so that you can be your own stockboy. A Walmart has 140,000 SKUs, which have to be tediously sorted, replaced on shelves, reordered, delivered, and so forth. People tend to radically underestimate the costs imposed by complexity, because the management problems do not simply add up; they multiply.
One way to think about this is Thanksgiving dinner: how come you, who are capable of getting a meal on the table 364 nights of the year, suddenly find yourself burning things, forgetting the creamed onions in the microwave, and bringing the mashed potatoes to the table a half an hour late? Because when you're cooking sixteen things instead of four, it is not the same as cooking four four-item meals. There are all sorts of complex interactions involving things like heating times and oven space, and adding more people to the problem, while probably necessary, itself multiplies the complexities.
Walmart has tried to reduce ("rationalize") the number of SKUs, but they were forced to backtrack and restore over 8,000 items to their stores. That's because most Costco shoppers are opportunity shoppers--they buy whatever is on sale at the moment, and supplement with frequent trips to the grocery store. Many Walmart shoppers, on the other hand, rely on the store for the majority of their needs--it has to be everything to everyone. That's really expensive, and it requires a lot of labor to keep track of all of those SKUs, figure out where to shelve them, etc. Walmart uses a lot more labor per sale than Costco does because it sells more than one kind of gum, and not always by the 24-pack.
You know how your husband hates going to Costco because you have to stand in line for twenty minutes? That's another part of Costco's low labor costs. Except for its very busiest days, like Black Friday, Walmart keeps more registers open, which speeds your passage through line, but also wastes expensive worker time standing at the checkout and waiting for people to come by. Again, this is not just some idiosyncratic decision that the stores have made because, well, people are different: customers will wait in line at Costco because they don't go there very often. At Walmart, which is many peoples' grocer, clothier, and auto supply shop, long lines would cost them a lot of business.
Costco's higher revenues are also a function of their demographic. Costco shoppers have an average income of $85,000--not surprising, because Costco tends to locate itself in affluent suburbs. Walmart shoppers are what the firm calls "value driven shoppers" which is to say, there's not a lot of spare money lying around the house, just waiting for an opportunity to buy a 6-lb wheel of Camembert. Value driven are very price conscious, and willing to forgoe things like service or artful displays in order to shave an extra 50 cents off the weekly shaving cream budget. If you've been wondering why Walmart seems serenely unworried that last Friday's labor action will touch of a boycott, this is why. If you took all the people in my twitter feed expressing excitement about a new era of labor organizing last Friday, I'd be very surprised to learn that they had spent as much as a thousand dollars between all of them at a Walmart last year.
Meanwhile, to speak more directly to Matt's point, Costco's margins are lower than Walmart's because they're basically a grocer with a sideline in televisions and kitchen gadgets. Margins are very slim in the grocery business: it's a big part of peoples' budgets, it's not particularly fun shopping, and people have a good sense of what the prices would be because they shop very frequently. Plus the losses to shrinkage and spoilage are very high. On the flip side, no matter how bad a recession gets, people still buy groceries, so those margins are pretty safe; if that weren't the case, we'd have lost all our grocers, along with our national dignity, in 2009.
Costco is doing very well for a grocer, but very poorly for a department store, the category to which Walmart technically belongs. Target, the store that is most like Walmart (albeit with a younger, more upscale demographic), has a profit margin of 4.1%.
One final thing that's worth pointing out is that Costco doesn't even make money selling the groceries and the six person hot-tubs. Their annual membership fee revenue exceeds their net profit--which is to say that the actual business of selling stuff is operating at a loss. They're charging you an annual fee to buy stuff at or near cost. That's a model that works really well with their basically affluent customer base, and not incidentally, a model that allows you to worry a bit less about your cost of sales. Sam's Club tries to do the same thing, but caters to a lower-income clientele and makes a lot less money despite having more stores.
The point of all of this is to say that while it might be true that Walmart could make more money by adopting Costco's labor model, there's no particular reason to think that this would be so. The differences in their labor models are not just some sort of personal preference, or ideological choice*; they're responses to the way that labor needs to be deployed to do the quite different things that these stores do. We say that "they're competitors" because they do compete with eachother in some markets, for a handful of SKUs. But very few people could replace their trips to Costco with visits to Walmart, or vice versa. Despite the superficial similarities (cheap stuff in large store) they're really very different, and you can no more graft one's labor model onto the other than you can buy a single pack of gum in the Costco checkout.
This is, of course, a separate question from whether a union should force Walmart to change its labor model; I'm merely addressing Matt's claim that there's obviously plenty of room for Walmart to lower margins, and more importantly, the rather fatuous argument that they should obviously do it voluntarily because it's better for everyone--the evergreen platitudes that I have wearily begun thinking of as the "Costco Shows it's Possible" story. Matt thankfully does not make that argument, but by God, everyone else does, so I'm afraid I've got a bit of pent up steam on the subject. Costco shows it's possible to be Costco and pay the wages that Costco pays. They have not demonstrated that it is possible to be Dollar General while doing the same.
I don't necessarily have much of a takeaway here--other than "Megan has accumulated a lot of factoids about Walmart and Costco that she would like to inflict upon her audience"--though I supposed I'd argue that before you decide whether this will be on net a good thing, you'd want to know whether changing the labor model would mean changing the business model--whether emulating Costco's admirably high pay would also mean emulating its extremely lean staffing models. That's something you need to know before you decide whether unionizing would, on net, make Walmart's 1.3 million US associates better off.
* So actually, Costco's labor model is partly an ideological choice; its founder and longtime CEO, James Sinegal, was a fairly committed progressive who paid himself a very modest salary. (He did, of course, own a good bit of stock). There is some question about whether this is going to continue long term; Sinegal overrode his executives on a bunch of stuff related to compensation. One signal to pay attention to: the incoming CEO makes more than twice what Sinegal did, though his mid-high six-figure salary still pales in comparison to the CEO of Walmart.
But whether or not Sinegal's ideology mattered, he would have had a hard time paying those kinds of salaries in a Walmart style operation, which is much more labor intensive, so that each extra dollar of wages cuts more deeply into the bottom line.
In public policy, a living wage or subsistence wage is the minimum income necessary for a worker to meet basic needs. These needs include shelter (housing) and other incidentals such as clothing and nutrition.
Generally, you seek work that hopefully
1.) You like
2.) Pays what you think you are worth
If those two things cant be met in your area, the age old tradition was to move to where you could find something that met those two criteria. Or you just worked your butt off to make the $$ you want.
And when you have insufficient money to live (i.e. a living wage), how exactly do you move somewhere else to get a better job? Moving is not cheap.
I left a very lucrative area/industry for a more rural existence. I am happier now, making about 1/2 what I used to make. Yes I work 3 jobs, but that's because I chose to live where I live, and I like my 3 jobs. I get paid gak at the gun store, but I get things at cost, and I get 10% of internet sales that I post.
So you had money and chose to make less money. Okay, that's easy. You had the money to move and chose to move. How do you move if you don't have the money to move? Walk to another state with better jobs?
If Walmart isnt paying enough, then leave for someone else who is.
Generally, you seek work that hopefully
1.) You like
2.) Pays what you think you are worth
If those two things cant be met in your area, the age old tradition was to move to where you could find something that met those two criteria. Or you just worked your butt off to make the $$ you want.
I left a very lucrative area/industry for a more rural existence. I am happier now, making about 1/2 what I used to make. Yes I work 3 jobs, but that's because I chose to live where I live, and I like my 3 jobs. I get paid gak at the gun store, but I get things at cost, and I get 10% of internet sales that I post.
If Walmart isnt paying enough, then leave for someone else who is.
You guys do know that there are parts of the country where even the concept of a sit-down job you like are foreign to the majority of the populace. They simply can't conceive of it, because those kind of jobs don't exist...
If Walmart is the only game in town, you can't just say 'Oh I'll go work somewhere where they treat me right'. There is no other place to work.
pretre wrote: You guys do know that there are parts of the country where even the concept of a sit-down job you like are foreign to the majority of the populace. They simply can't conceive of it, because those kind of jobs don't exist...
If Walmart is the only game in town, you can't just say 'Oh I'll go work somewhere where they treat me right'. There is no other place to work.
The poverty line is fairly well defined. See http://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty/13poverty.cfm. My personal take on what a living wage is, is a wage that doesn't require you to turn to the government for handouts. Close to 50% of walmart workers qualify for foodstamps. That means that those workers are being underpaid, and my taxes are making up the difference. Walmart can afford to pay more, but they don't, because Alice Walton likes to see her name high on the Forbes list.
Generally, you seek work that hopefully
1.) You like
2.) Pays what you think you are worth
If those two things cant be met in your area, the age old tradition was to move to where you could find something that met those two criteria. Or you just worked your butt off to make the $$ you want.
I left a very lucrative area/industry for a more rural existence. I am happier now, making about 1/2 what I used to make. Yes I work 3 jobs, but that's because I chose to live where I live, and I like my 3 jobs. I get paid gak at the gun store, but I get things at cost, and I get 10% of internet sales that I post.
If Walmart isnt paying enough, then leave for someone else who is.
This is a fairly narrow view to take. Unemployment in the US is still very high. "Someone else" probably doesn't exist. When Walmart posts a job opening and has 400 applicants, in spite of well-known wage deficiencies and work conditions, that's a good sign that there aren't other options. Not everyone can move somewhere else easily either, there are things like family considerations, and moving both costs money, and then deprives you of any existing support network.
Walmart, and other big national chains, are frequently responsible for the lack of other options. When a Walmart comes to town, local businesses close down. Often these businesses have been members of the community for years and have paid solid wages to their few employees. They simply cannot compete with Walmart's economy-of-scale purchasing power. Walmart may offer lower prices, but having a Walmart move into your area has been proven to depress wages across the board in the surrounding communities. The same guy who ran a local mom&pop store is now working at Walmart for half as much.
How exactly do you do that if you currently aren't making enough money to live?
Let's assume you manage to scrounge bus money by not eating or feeding your kids.
You arrive 'where the jobs are'. How do you live there while you try to find this job?
It is easy to move somewhere for a new job when you already have an okay job. (I've done it.) It isn't easy when you're not making a living wage or are unemployed already.
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Redbeard wrote: Close to 50% of walmart workers qualify for foodstamps. That means that those workers are being underpaid, and my taxes are making up the difference. Walmart can afford to pay more, but they don't, because Alice Walton likes to see her name high on the Forbes list.
I think a lot of bootstrappers don't realize this. You're already paying for these people. If Walmart paid them more, you would pay less for these people. You literally win if Walmart pays these folks a living wage because you pay less taxes by not having to support the millions of people working for Walmart.
I'm in favour of a raise to minimum wage and getting rid of loopholes that allow employers to work someone 39.5 hours. I think anyone who works full time, regardless of how "lowly" their job may seem, deserves to earn a living wage. While I doubt this will happen, I favour a return to a 1960's level (inflation adjusted) minimum wage and tax rates, even though in the short-term, this would probably affect me negatively (I'd have to pay more taxes, and it would take a few years before the real economic engine gains would be realized).
I believe we've been sold a false hope ("trickle-down economics") that has proven to do nothing but line the pockets of the already wealthy, and believe we'd all be better off returning to a pre-Reagan economic model. I believe this would also require an adjustment to the corporate culture that says the corporate responsibility is solely to the stockholder (another 80'sism that provides questionable moral justification for poor corporate citizenship). Prior to this, corporations typically took responsibility for their employees and their communities, as well as their shareholders. (I read a good article on this recently, but can't remember where).
Fair enough... I'd be willing to have another national discussion on raising the minimum wage... but I'm very skeptical that it needs to be $15/ hr. (fwiw, I think we'd can easily shoulder it to be $9/hr with major negatve economic impact).
However... pre-Reagan economic model would be a disaster now. Also, going full-bore "supply-side" economic right now wouldn't work because the incentives to expand/research/invest isn't quite there yet, as folks are sitting on their money right now... waiting... for something.
I think we need to re-emphasize on training/educating the workforce to be more nimble than to force business to "support us". That's why UNION shops are such a dying species... and for the life of me, I don't understand why UNIONs don't embrace this concept (being more nimble). That's why you're seeing folks getting higher jobs that they really didn't go to school for... (see Alf's case).
*shrugs* I'm just leery of the government intervening to mandate "living wage" laws... time, time again we've seen unintended consquences... such as the ACA law. I.E. for smaller companies, it's in THEIR best interest to minimize their full-time employees below 50.
How exactly do you do that if you currently aren't making enough money to live?
Let's assume you manage to scrounge bus money by not eating or feeding your kids.
You arrive 'where the jobs are'. How do you live there while you try to find this job?
It is easy to move somewhere for a new job when you already have an okay job. (I've done it.) It isn't easy when you're not making a living wage or are unemployed already.
Easy, here is what I did.
Lost my job at Wells Fargo making 9 dollars an hour as a collector when I was 19. I couldn't find employment other than ShopKo (Shopko is like a small ghetto Target) I was getting paid 7 dollars an hour as a cashier. As I could barely afford to live I had to find a way out.
So I joined the Navy
I was making pretty good money in the Navy, worked my arse off to get to where I am.
The Navy paid for my school and once I was out i was able to get a position in a related field.
I am sure nearly everyone can relate to being in hard times but it's up to the person to take measures to make sure they are happy. I have a hard time taking pity on people when I know when I was in the same situation I overcame it and made a living for myself.
Everyone in America has the opportunity to build a life for themselves and there family. It all has to do with how motivated you are.
Lost my job at Wells Fargo making 9 dollars an hour as a collector when I was 19. I couldn't find employment other than ShopKo (Shopko is like a small ghetto Target) I was getting paid 7 dollars an hour as a cashier. As I could barely afford to live I had to find a way out.
So I joined the Navy
I was making pretty good money in the Navy, worked my arse off to get to where I am.
The Navy paid for my school and once I was out i was able to get a position in a related field.
I am sure nearly everyone can relate to being in hard times but it's up to the person to take measures to make sure they are happy. I have a hard time taking pity on people when I know when I was in the same situation I overcame it and made a living for myself.
Everyone in America has the opportunity to build a life for themselves and there family. It all has to do with motivated you are.
This is my experience.
So everyone who is not making a living wage should join a branch of the military? That's your solution? Just because you were able to make it in the military doesn't mean that everyone can. Not to mention that the government can't afford to hire everyone.
Redbeard wrote: Close to 50% of walmart workers qualify for foodstamps. That means that those workers are being underpaid, and my taxes are making up the difference. Walmart can afford to pay more, but they don't, because Alice Walton likes to see her name high on the Forbes list.
I think a lot of bootstrappers don't realize this. You're already paying for these people. If Walmart paid them more, you would pay less for these people. You literally win if Walmart pays these folks a living wage because you pay less taxes by not having to support the millions of people working for Walmart.
Sooo... are you advocating a "Walmart tax"?
Or, a Walmart specific living wage law? Similar to what DC passed? Guess what? Walmart was going to open up 3 new stores in the more impoverish areas in DC... but, since this law... they backed out.
whembly wrote: Sooo... are you advocating a "Walmart tax"?
Or, a Walmart specific living wage law? Similar to what DC passed? Guess what? Walmart was going to open up 3 new stores in the more impoverish areas in DC... but, since this law... they backed out.
Force it across the board in the US. Then they can't back out. Which would you rather have? More jobs that don't pay a living wage and cost the tax payers more or the same number (or even less) of jobs that pay a living wage and don't cost taxpayers.
Do we really need more crappy jobs that force people to go on government aid?
Lost my job at Wells Fargo making 9 dollars an hour as a collector when I was 19. I couldn't find employment other than ShopKo (Shopko is like a small ghetto Target) I was getting paid 7 dollars an hour as a cashier. As I could barely afford to live I had to find a way out.
So I joined the Navy
I was making pretty good money in the Navy, worked my arse off to get to where I am.
The Navy paid for my school and once I was out i was able to get a position in a related field.
I am sure nearly everyone can relate to being in hard times but it's up to the person to take measures to make sure they are happy. I have a hard time taking pity on people when I know when I was in the same situation I overcame it and made a living for myself.
Everyone in America has the opportunity to build a life for themselves and there family. It all has to do with motivated you are.
This is my experience.
So everyone who is not making a living wage should join a branch of the military? That's your solution? Just because you were able to make it in the military doesn't mean that everyone can. Not to mention that the government can't afford to hire everyone.
That is my solution as that's why I said
"This is my experience"
I didn't say this is what everyone needs to do, it worked for me I was just stating to your point in saying you can't do anything if you are stuck in a town only working at walmart.
whembly wrote: Sooo... are you advocating a "Walmart tax"?
Or, a Walmart specific living wage law? Similar to what DC passed? Guess what? Walmart was going to open up 3 new stores in the more impoverish areas in DC... but, since this law... they backed out.
Force it across the board in the US. Then they can't back out. Which would you rather have? More jobs that don't pay a living wage and cost the tax payers more or the same number (or even less) of jobs that pay a living wage and don't cost taxpayers.
Do we really need more crappy jobs that force people to go on government aid?
So... we're back to raising the National Min Wage.
Okay, but that doesn't work for everyone. I am glad that you managed to pull yourself up. Why begrudge someone else a different solution then? Obviously, your solution won't work for everyone. So saying 'Hey, I did well. Why don't they all do what I did?' isn't really helpful.
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whembly wrote: So... we're back to raising the National Min Wage.
Okay...
I think it is a bit different than that, although that is part of it. Redbeard already brought up the business of 32-39.5 hour jobs just to screw people out of benefits and pay.
Simply making Walmart raise the wage will probably not fix the problem, however. Because then they will just hire more folks and have them all work 10 hours a week.
pities2004 wrote: But there are still options out there for people to get out from working at Walmart.
It's not rocket science.
If it was maybe they could get the 25 dollars they are asking for.
Okay, what are those options? Be specific.
If you live in a backass town in East Bumfeth, North Dakota, what exactly is your option? Walmart came in and closed down all the other similar retail businesses. So where do you work?
pities2004 wrote: But there are still options out there for people to get out from working at Walmart.
It's not rocket science.
If it was maybe they could get the 25 dollars they are asking for.
Okay, what are those options? Be specific.
If you live in a backass town in East Bumfeth, North Dakota, what exactly is your option? Walmart came in and closed down all the other similar retail businesses. So where do you work?
I grew up in South Dakota and was able to do something with my life.
I grew up in South Dakota and was able to do something with my life.
Apples to apples.
You joined the Navy. I completely agree with you that joining the military is ONE way of getting yourself out of poverty. Stop bringing it up because it isn't going to work for everyone in South Dakota. The government can't afford to hire everyone who isn't earning a living wage.
So what's your option if you don't join the military? Go on the dole? Walk to Minnesota?
We were sold the bill of goods that "our economy must transition from a manufacturing base to a service base". Those jobs got shipped off. All we have left are chump jobs like Walmart in many areas of the country.
Now service jobs are shipped off. Anyone call HP or Dell lately?
Then, we get a string of progressives in office who spend money we dont have, or demand that banks give loans to people who cant pay (then cover the loses for the banks), or get us into wars we couldnt afford.
Then we get litigation out the wazoo that increases medical costs, then reward an over-charging medical industry by hiring executives of those industries to run government oversite that in turn INCREASES those medical costs to us and the government, lining the pocket of both the medical industry AND legislators. And now we get a broke government over-reaching it's Constitutional limitations by attempting to control our health, and written into the legislation make it so that employers would want to limit their workers to part time to avoid STEEP costs imposed by that same government. And it only serves to make those employees more dependent on the government for health/income.
Oh, and then that same broke government makes it so that those unemployed would want to stay unemployed living like serfs on a government handout.
Making matters even BETTER, this same government floods the employee pool by making it even easier for illegal aliens to enter an already distressed country. Oh, and then that broke government's social services get even more stressed/depleted as it struggles to keep up with the artificially inflated demand.
On top of that, the government continues to stretch its reach and encroach on the Rights of the people to privacy, self defense and speech. All in the name of Security. Security for who?
We are all being played.
There is no real difference between Democrat/Republican lately. Crony capitalism is running amok, the ultra wealthy are getting richer, the poor are being "kept", the middle working class are being squeezed into serfdom, and the political class is too busy insulating itself from the laws it creates on us as well as making BUCKETS of money. The media gives them cover to do all this, being complicit rather than being the watchdog..
I think it is a bit different than that, although that is part of it. Redbeard already brought up the business of 32-39.5 hour jobs just to screw people out of benefits and pay.
Simply making Walmart raise the wage will probably not fix the problem, however. Because then they will just hire more folks and have them all work 10 hours a week.
Now we're getting somewhere...
I actually think that Walmart & Walmart employee would benefit if they'd Unionize (See UPS). The initial years would be wonkey as Walmart would have to reduce staffing and there would be some price fluctuations. But, in the end, things would work itself out just fine.
As to "the business of 32-39.5 hour jobs just to screw people out of benefits and pay"... it gets worst:
In the ACA [ur=http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/4980H]30 hours[/url] is considered "full-time". That's a disincentive for employers for scheduling more hours.
Maybe we need to look at the state/fed laws and regulations to reduce these non-incentives with respect to these benefits.
I grew up in South Dakota and was able to do something with my life.
Apples to apples.
You joined the Navy. I completely agree with you that joining the military is ONE way of getting yourself out of poverty. Stop bringing it up because it isn't going to work for everyone in South Dakota. The government can't afford to hire everyone who isn't earning a living wage.
So what's your option if you don't join the military? Go on the dole? Walk to Minnesota?
So your suggestion is just continue to sit on your butt and work at walmart and EXPECT to get paid 25 dollars an hour?
I actually think that Walmart & Walmart employee would benefit if they'd Unionize (See UPS). The initial years would be wonkey as Walmart would have to reduce staffing and there would be some price fluctuations. But, in the end, things would work itself out just fine.
As to "the business of 32-39.5 hour jobs just to screw people out of benefits and pay"... it gets worst:
In the ACA [ur=http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/4980H]30 hours[/url] is considered "full-time". That's a disincentive for employers for scheduling more hours.
Maybe we need to look at the state/fed laws and regulations to reduce these non-incentives with respect to these benefits.
I'm iffy on unions. They can do great good and do great harm. I think making Walmart a union shop might actually benefit their industry though.
Your final point is definitely what I mean though. We need to look at the climate (regulatory and legal) that makes it a good idea for big companies to treat their workers like gak and get away with it. We need to do that without penalizing the little companies that don't do those things. That's the hard part. The problem being that, of course, Walmart can get away with whatever they want and increased regulation often doesn't really hurt them whereas it usually hurts the little guys proportionately more.
I was raised in poverty, often times I had to eat at a soup kitchen and got my school supplies and clothes from donations. This was in South Dakota where the work opportunities are not that great. Looks like I broke the statistics.
Sad times when the backlash is if you want to get paid more you can just refuse to work.
The college system in our country is fethed up beyond belief.
Edit: For what it's worth, I still have plans to go into teaching, just probably not for the next 4 years or so until I get a few things paid off...
I agree it is fethed up. College professors are less qualified to teach than most public school teachers. But what else is fethed up is the lie they have sold to people going to college.
Also, Won't you lose your certification and be unable to teach if you don't obtain your masters within 5 years? So what good does working for 4 years 'elsewhere' do when by time you are ready to teach you are 1 year within being certified in your field?
cincydooley wrote:Additionally, your whole "10 months of work" claim is a complete fallacy in regards to any teacher that is actually good at their job. It's a little insulting, actually. But that's the general attitude in the States towards teachers, so it isn't wholly unexpected..
How is it a fallacy? Teachers are contractually paid for 10 month employment regardless of how hard they work. They are literally locked out of the building and unable to work for those 2 months by union requirement. Even the best teachers who work 12 hour days during the school year literally do not spend all summer 'working' for nothing.
Getting an annual salary for 10 months of employment allows you to spend those other 2 months working somewhere else if you so choose. I have friends who would work at the beach as bartenders for 2 months and make thousands of dollars int hat time to supplement their income. Others did summer camp which saves them 2 months of utilities and such. Others save money and then 'don't work' all summer.
Teachers who work in the summer get stipends and extra pay increasing their annual income. Sure some stipends are woefully underpaid for the effort, but it is still income.
So comparing a teachers annual income to another 'full time annual income' is very valid to mention they go unworking for 2 months out of the year which means they are free to make 'more' income where someone who works 12 months at a job with a similar annual income doesn't have the freedom to spend 2 months working elsewhere.
But look at what a teacher has to go through even to make that much, but yet walmart people should make more than a teacher simply because they are entitled to a 'living wage' which includes a lot of luxuries? And they think somehow this happens in a vacuum where they end up making 25$ an hour but the costs of all the other goods and services in the world stay exactly the same? That is all madness.
FYI: I rented rooms to college graduates to help them get along. Renting a room is still very common way to survive and while you may lose some of your personal freedoms living under someone else's roof, you can afford to live there. There is no expectation that a 'living wage' should guarantee someone a place to live by themselves or to support a family of 4. Those are luxuries. I know many people who had to get a roomate, take in a border or even be a boarder with their kids in tow. People do it every day.
really... more people who only have skills worth minimum wage, wanting more then their work is worth...
sure go ahead and strike, more power too you, not gonna hurt me any if people make more $...
but this is just delusional... its minimum wage, get some skills, get a better job,
or start your own wal mart type company that pays more to its minimum skill workers and see how profitable you are...
bottom of the barrel jobs deserve bottom of the barrel pay...
next you will be telling me that mcdonalds workers, who have an easy job that literally any warm body can do, will be wanting 15$ an hour or something rediculous like that...
minimum skill = minimum wage...
if the argument is that they literally cannot get a better job, then again, that is the result of them possesing minimum skills/education/ect...
pities2004 wrote: I was raised in poverty, often times I had to eat at a soup kitchen and got my school supplies and clothes from donations. This was in South Dakota where the work opportunities are not that great. Looks like I broke the statistics.
Sad times when the backlash is if you want to get paid more you can just refuse to work.
I think I'm done here.
yeah, i agree with you, as someone who, did not have a vehicle, had to live on 1$ of food a day, live in a 300$ a month rented room instead of a real apartment, with no tv, internet, utilize labour ready type jobs (where you make less then minumum wage, because the labour office takes a cut of your minimum hourly wage)
it was hard
but that is the point... you only get ahead if you are willing to endure all that hardship, and do without all the useless wants that people seem to think they "need"
not statistic breaking IMO, everyone I know who has a "pull up by the boot straps story" tells me the same thing, "worked hard, got ahead eventually",
everyone who keeps complaining about how impossible it is for them to get ahead, just keeps complaining about it, or refuseing to take actions outside their comfort zone, their story is an endless complaint
it really is a world where those who work harder/smarter get ahead, and those that dont, or do nothing but complain stay behind.
The college system in our country is fethed up beyond belief.
Edit: For what it's worth, I still have plans to go into teaching, just probably not for the next 4 years or so until I get a few things paid off...
I agree it is fethed up. College professors are less qualified to teach than most public school teachers. But what else is fethed up is the lie they have sold to people going to college.
Also, Won't you lose your certification and be unable to teach if you don't obtain your masters within 5 years? So what good does working for 4 years 'elsewhere' do when by time you are ready to teach you are 1 year within being certified in your field?
Nope, not unless they feth with licensure. I have to be enrolled in a masters program within 5 years of starting teaching and complete it within 10. Some school districts help with that, some do not.
nkelsch wrote: FYI: I rented rooms to college graduates to help them get along. Renting a room is still very common way to survive and while you may lose some of your personal freedoms living under someone else's roof, you can afford to live there. There is no expectation that a 'living wage' should guarantee someone a place to live by themselves or to support a family of 4. Those are luxuries. I know many people who had to get a roomate, take in a border or even be a boarder with their kids in tow. People do it every day.
I'd love to be able to get a room to rent, the three that I looked at were 300 to 450 dollars a month to rent and were utter gakholes... For those prices I could have gotten a roommate and gotten an actual apartment/house/condo.
Fair enough... I'd be willing to have another national discussion on raising the minimum wage... but I'm very skeptical that it needs to be $15/ hr. (fwiw, I think we'd can easily shoulder it to be $9/hr with major negatve economic impact).
However... pre-Reagan economic model would be a disaster now. Also, going full-bore "supply-side" economic right now wouldn't work because the incentives to expand/research/invest isn't quite there yet, as folks are sitting on their money right now... waiting... for something.
Why would that economic model be a disaster? $15/hour is roughly where it was in the 60s, adjusting for inflation.
I think we need to re-emphasize on training/educating the workforce to be more nimble than to force business to "support us". That's why UNION shops are such a dying species... and for the life of me, I don't understand why UNIONs don't embrace this concept (being more nimble). That's why you're seeing folks getting higher jobs that they really didn't go to school for... (see Alf's case).
How does being nimble help when the jobs aren't there? When they've been offshored.
*shrugs* I'm just leery of the government intervening to mandate "living wage" laws... time, time again we've seen unintended consquences... such as the ACA law. I.E. for smaller companies, it's in THEIR best interest to minimize their full-time employees below 50.
Now,see, this is where I have a problem with this argument. "I'm leery of government intervention." - The government has already intervened. I'm leery of the Government dropping the tax rates on the wealthy, but this already happened. I'm leery of the government easing import restrictions, allowing us to become dependent on foreign manufacturing, but that already happened too. Why is it okay for the government to interfere in the market when it's to the advantage of the wealthy, but not when its to the advantage of the majority?
whembly wrote: That's why you're seeing folks getting higher jobs that they really didn't go to school for... (see Alf's case).
To be fair, the job that I have right now is a direct result of the other sort of education I got while in college. While I went to school for education, I worked for the school's IT department, which has helped me net my current job.
I'm in favour of a raise to minimum wage and getting rid of loopholes that allow employers to work someone 39.5 hours. I think anyone who works full time, regardless of how "lowly" their job may seem, deserves to earn a living wage. While I doubt this will happen, I favour a return to a 1960's level (inflation adjusted) minimum wage and tax rates, even though in the short-term, this would probably affect me negatively (I'd have to pay more taxes, and it would take a few years before the real economic engine gains would be realized).
I believe we've been sold a false hope ("trickle-down economics") that has proven to do nothing but line the pockets of the already wealthy, and believe we'd all be better off returning to a pre-Reagan economic model. I believe this would also require an adjustment to the corporate culture that says the corporate responsibility is solely to the stockholder (another 80'sism that provides questionable moral justification for poor corporate citizenship). Prior to this, corporations typically took responsibility for their employees and their communities, as well as their shareholders. (I read a good article on this recently, but can't remember where).
pities2004 wrote: I was raised in poverty, often times I had to eat at a soup kitchen and got my school supplies and clothes from donations. This was in South Dakota where the work opportunities are not that great. Looks like I broke the statistics.
Sad times when the backlash is if you want to get paid more you can just refuse to work.
I think I'm done here.
yeah, i agree with you, as someone who, did not have a vehicle, had to live on 1$ of food a day, live in a 300$ a month rented room instead of a real apartment, with no tv, internet, utilize labour ready type jobs (where you make less then minumum wage, because the labour office takes a cut of your minimum hourly wage)
it was hard
but that is the point... you only get ahead if you are willing to endure all that hardship, and do without all the useless wants that people seem to think they "need"
not statistic breaking IMO, everyone I know who has a "pull up by the boot straps story" tells me the same thing, "worked hard, got ahead eventually",
everyone who keeps complaining about how impossible it is for them to get ahead, just keeps complaining about it, or refuseing to take actions outside their comfort zone, their story is an endless complaint
it really is a world where those who work harder/smarter get ahead, and those that dont, or do nothing but complain stay behind.
It's weird that the people who worked hard to get ahead came from affluent households, isn't it? Almost as if we had a class system in place...
Since we're throwing around anecdotes, I have a friend who's a nuclear physisist. She went to a very nice school in the south of England, and went to a very nice university (Manchester), and has ended up getting a very nice job. Now, though she's not a stupid person, her innate intelligence is no less than a dozen people I could name at the factory I work at. But she had rich parents, those guys didn't. Those fethers didn't stand a chance.
And I voted in favour of the 1% pay rise and against the strike, before anyone starts calling class warrior on me.
pities2004 wrote: I was raised in poverty, often times I had to eat at a soup kitchen and got my school supplies and clothes from donations. This was in South Dakota where the work opportunities are not that great. Looks like I broke the statistics.
Sad times when the backlash is if you want to get paid more you can just refuse to work.
I think I'm done here.
yeah, i agree with you, as someone who, did not have a vehicle, had to live on 1$ of food a day, live in a 300$ a month rented room instead of a real apartment, with no tv, internet, utilize labour ready type jobs (where you make less then minumum wage, because the labour office takes a cut of your minimum hourly wage)
it was hard
but that is the point... you only get ahead if you are willing to endure all that hardship, and do without all the useless wants that people seem to think they "need"
not statistic breaking IMO, everyone I know who has a "pull up by the boot straps story" tells me the same thing, "worked hard, got ahead eventually",
everyone who keeps complaining about how impossible it is for them to get ahead, just keeps complaining about it, or refuseing to take actions outside their comfort zone, their story is an endless complaint
it really is a world where those who work harder/smarter get ahead, and those that dont, or do nothing but complain stay behind.
It's weird that the people who worked hard to get ahead came from affluent households, isn't it? Almost as if we had a class system in place...
Since we're throwing around anecdotes, I have a friend who's a nuclear physisist. She went to a very nice school in the south of England, and went to a very nice university (Manchester), and has ended up getting a very nice job. Now, though she's not a stupid person, her innate intelligence is no less than a dozen people I could name at the factory I work at. But she had rich parents, those guys didn't. Those fethers didn't stand a chance.
And I voted in favour of the 1% pay rise and against the strike, before anyone starts calling class warrior on me.
how are two people, raised in poor households,examples of people from affluent/rich families....
if you are born into a rich family, there isnt anything to pull up with them bootstraps in the first place...
It is a plain fact that the proportion of upper class children who get into university and top careers is much higher than the proportion of lower class children who manage it.
Is that due to innate stupidity and laziness of the lower classes, or unequal life chances?
I think this is quite a good video highlighting why it is important that people should be pushing for higher, living wages at the bottom end as well as higher wages in the middle.
For those that joined the Military. Props to you. I did the same thing and was only going to do one enlistment and manage to stay for 23 years. Petre (if not you) no need to bash the thought process or outside the box thinking. Granted Active Duty Military cannot "hire" everyone but chances are pretty good on getting in if one scores high on the ASVAB and education. So one of four branches can pick someone up. Air Force, Army, Navy and Marines. Some individuals though cannot handle a regimented life style of Active Duty so pretty much stop their chain of thoughts there. So pretty much the National Guard and the Reserve branches are not look into. Its one weekend a month and two weeks a year of training. Though one can volunteer for schools and additional training hereby going on active duty. Its additional income. Its simple for us to think that do to we were both military but to the average individual its a tunnel vision process. Though its the military and we do fight wars. The big turn off from that was OIF and OEF. People have ask on here on threads about picking up extra cash. Then the Reserves or NG is a sure thing unless that individual screws it up themselves.
As I mention earlier on the Fast Food thread. I have no "Guilt" for those who resigns themselves to thinking the Fast Food industry is their only choice of work. I cannot help them if they do not think "Outside the box". If you are glued into one area and its your "comfort" area then that individual pretty much is staying in that "area". They are unwilling to make the sacrifice of leaving the area they are comfortable with and will stay in the area and concern themselves with jobs only in that area.
For those that think outside the box well they pretty much explore pretty all facets. Monster.com, USAjobs, and whatever job search engines that appeals to them. Drop resumes like mad. A bus ticket is way cheaper then a plane ticket. Renting a room off the bat is way cheaper then a apartment. One can live with whatever is in a duffel or a kit bag. As for saving money. Either live the parents. Eat ramen noodles for a month. Whatever you have to do to get that nest egg to make it happen. Get a credit Card and build up your credit scores because pretty much the idea of a personnel loan going to cross your mind. Get a car. Well you really do not need a "Fast n Furious" car, a sports car, or a current SUV that's in style. Bite the bullet and drive a Civic. Do one really need to play WoW? EQ and EQ2 is FTP so get your fix in that. Do one need the current hottest item of a cell phone? A Iphone or whatever the 400-500 G3 network device. Its just to me a "status symbol" Do you really need that 62" Flat screen? A PS4 or Xbox720? Really don't need cable TV. Hulu and Netflix is great and under ten bucks a month if one choose to pay. Hell Youtube has quite a selection. Internet only like 70 dollars a month.
How many here have actually and I mean ACTUALLY sat down and think on your expenses? I love my steaks and I'm not skimpy on that but I'm not paying ten dollars a pound for T-Bone. The cheap meat with a nice marble is good enough for me. Brand name food well Hell its the same as or similar to generic brands. Goodwill and Thrift stores I've no issue buying from either though I will nuke the clothes in the washer. Butt Wipe on the other hand I spend a bit on. I do not like the 40 grit TP the military provides so I spurge on a good name brand.
Back to the jobs though. People, I'm going to say, some people want it all and expect some things are a "give me". That the "jobs" needed to be provided to them where they live. Work that involves little effort but pays a lot. Fast Food jobs seems to have lost the "mission" over time. If I remember correctly that Fast Food jobs was entry level work to prepare you for the job force. Same as WalMart retail workers. If the individual whole life evolves around that one job and does not seek ways to improve one skill sets then why should they get paid more then a "Tech" wage. If your retail and work the floor I see ten dollars top with time in grade or time in years till one improves on leadership skill sets. Well Management skill sets. Same as a warehouse worker or stock helper...who ever handles restocking the shelves. Ten dollars same as above. A fork lift operator though 13-14 dollars and then Management with the acquired management/logistic skill sets.
Individuals just focus on that one aspect. Their "One Lane" of responsibility and no more. Sometimes they even screw that up. Since they are getting paid min wage why would they put forth the effort to achieve/learn more if no incentive is there. People are coming to expect it and not develop it. People also have a tendency to try to live beyond their means. Have to borrow money to buy baby diapers from your parents but packing a 400 dollar Iphone (example).
Damn did not mean to go on like this. It just irks the Hell out of me when people think I need to feel sorry for a situation when I know damn well that those individuals need to apply more brain power and effort to make things happen for them. What happens if the individual is offered a job to write cursive for whatever reason then to write cursive for a 15 dollar wage when that individual did not learn how to write in cursive.
Back to the jobs though. People, I'm going to say, some people want it all and expect some things are a "give me". That the "jobs" needed to be provided to them where they live. Work that involves little effort but pays a lot. Fast Food jobs seems to have lost the "mission" over time. If I remember correctly that Fast Food jobs was entry level work to prepare you for the job force.
Unless you're a lot older than your writing would indicate, no, you don't remember (correctly or otherwise). Fast Food has been around since the 50s, and you don't sound like a geezer. What's more, even through the 60s, a full-time fast food job would pay a living wage. It may not have been glamourous, but it was work, and it was paid.
What you're not realizing is that it isn't the work that is changed, it's everything in the world except the work, and the wage has not kept pace.
See, there's this thing called inflation. Ideally, the minimum wage would be tied to one of the indexes that measures inflation, so that as the cost of living went up, so would the minimum wage. But the big minimum wage employers lobby like hell to keep that from happening, and as our politicians are all bought and paid for, it doesn't happen.
Read this, which is long and technical, but based in fact, rather than relying on the myth that fast food workers don't deserve a living wage.
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=405
If minimum wage had kept pace with inflation, it would be worth about $10.50/hour today, which at full time would work out to roughly $21k/year. That, by the way, is enough to prevent a single person from qualifying for food stamps; it's a living wage.
You make it sound like these people are demanding huge pay increases and the ability to live like kings. They're not. They're simply asking that their pay rate keep pace with inflation, and that they're able to afford the bare minimums in life without relying on your taxes.
NuggzTheNinja wrote: No offense, but the word "deserve" has no place in this discussion. People make what people are worth. If an employee doesn't have a unique and competitive skill then he is not worth paying a unique and competitive salary.
If peoeple assume that fringe right wing, crazy pants economics are an unquestionable truth that we must mould our economies around... then yeah, 'deserve' has no place in this discussion. But we don't, because most of us learned something from the Gilded Age.
And if we assume 'worth' is a product only of shifting market forces, and has nothing to do with the individual, then sure, whatever you're paid you 'earned'. But we don't, because even though we might not have read the economic texts that dismantle that nonsense, we instinctively understand it's fething stupid to state a person is 'worth' his $50,000 salary, when without the company he works for, and the greater society that company exists within that individual would never be able to generate $50,000 worth of goods in a single year.
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NuggzTheNinja wrote: My point is that responsible people who think to themselves, "I'm not making enough money" will go out and find new jobs or get second jobs, NOT stamp their feet and demand better pay. This is an exceptionally poor idea when an employee is as replaceable as a Wendy's burger flipper.
So your approach is to pretty much just pretend collective action never happened?
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PhantomViper wrote: Its not "so little", it is what the market as a whole as deemed his salary should be.
Are you honest to God going to sit there and claim that the labour market operates in anything like the conditions needed for perfect market results?
District Mayor Vincent C. Gray vetoed legislation Thursday that would force the city’s largest retailers to pay a super-minimum wage to their workers, ending two months of uncertainty over the controversial bill’s fate and setting up a decisive override vote at the D.C. Council as early as Tuesday.
The debate over the bill, the Large Retailer Accountability Act, has polarized local leaders while garnering national attention and putting focus on the low wages many retail chains pay their workers.
Gray (D) announced his veto in a letter to Council Chairman Phil Mendelson delivered Thursday morning that explained his opposition to the bill and disclosed his intention to seek a minimum-wage hike for all employers, not just large retailers.
(Make your case: Do you support the mayor’s decision?)
Mendelson said he was “disappointed” by the mayor’s decision, which he said is “not good for workers.”
In the letter, Gray said the bill was “not a true living-wage bill, because it would raise the minimum wage only for a small fraction of the District’s workforce.” He added the bill is a “job-killer,” citing threats from Wal-Mart and other retailers that they will not locate to the city if the bill becomes law.
“If I were to sign this bill into law, it would do nothing but hinder our ability to create jobs, drive away retailers, and set us back on the path to prosperity for all,” he said.
Gray did not say what minimum wage he would seek except that there should be a “reasonable increase.”
The bill would require retailers with corporate sales of $1 billion or more and operating District stores of at least 75,000 square feet to pay their employees a “living wage” — no less than $12.50 an hour in combined wages and benefits. The proposal includes an exception for employers who collectively bargain with their employees, and existing employers have four years to come into compliance under the law.
The city’s existing minimum wage is $8.25 an hour. The bill would raise the annual earnings of a full-time employee making the lowest legally permissible wage from about $17,000 to $26,000.
While the bill’s supporters repeatedly insisted it was not targeted at Wal-Mart, the debate was inextricably tied to the retail giant’s plans, announced in late 2010, to open as many as six stores in the city in the coming months and years.
The union exemption and square-footage requirement rankled Wal-Mart officials, who said those provisions created an uneven playing field — particularly with respect to the unionized grocery chains they plan to compete with in the city.
A day ahead of the bill’s final passage last month, Wal-Mart told council members and the public that it would abandon plans for three of the six stores and explore options for withdrawing from the others should legislators proceed. The ultimatum changed no votes on the council.
Wal-Mart spokesman Steven Restivo called the veto “good news for D.C. residents,” saying Gray chose “jobs, economic development and common sense over special interests.”
Restivo said the company will move forward with its first stores in the District: “We look forward to finishing the work we started in the city almost three years ago.”
Wal-Mart’s entry into the city has prompted a political identity crisis for many elected officials, forced to reconcile their liberal, pro-union sentiments with the desire to create jobs and better retail options for their constituents.
Key council members, including Mendelson (D) and Business Affairs Committee chair Vincent B. Orange (D-At Large), were unabashed in support of the bill, giving it momentum that similar measures had lacked in prior council terms.
But Gray made no secret in recent months that, for him, jobs and retail took priority.
Wal-Mart's entry into the city was an early political coup for Gray, and he personally lobbied — some say threatened — top company executives to commit to a store at the Skyland Town Center development not far from Gray’s home in Ward 7.
The Skyland store is among those Wal-Mart has threatened to abandon should the living-wage bill become law. The developer of the project, Gary D. Rappaport, has said the project cannot move forward at this time without Wal-Mart’s commitment.
If the council fails to override the veto, Restivo said, “all stores are back on.”
Gray gave little indication in recent weeks that he was seriously entertaining signing the bill. His deputy mayor for planning and economic development, Victor L. Hoskins, warned after the council vote that the bill would devastate the city’s retail development efforts, and his communications staff shared letters urging a veto — and none encouraging him to sign it. In interviews, Gray was quick to cite arguments against the bill but rarely acknowledged supporters’ point of view.
The coalition of labor unions, city clergy and progressive political activists backing the bill have over the past six weeks canvassed neighborhoods and held media events in hopes of pressuring Gray into signing the bill. Wal-Mart and other large retailers, they argued, could pay their workers better wages without significantly harming their bottom lines.
Some said they considered Wal-Mart’s ultimatum a bluff; others said they would rather see the retailer walk away than accept its “poverty wages.” Wal-Mart has pushed back on the notion that its wages are considerably less than other retailers, saying its pay would be “competitive” and accusing the grocery workers’ union of signing a contract that pays some of its members wages that would not comply with the living-wage law.
Business groups, other retailers and even former mayor Anthony A. Williams urged Gray to veto the bill, citing the potential job losses, the effect on grocery access, “retail leakage” to the suburbs and potential harm to the city’s business reputation.
Gray’s decision sets up a final political showdown with the council, which can override the veto with a two-thirds vote within 30 days. Mendelson told his colleagues Thursday that the override vote will take place Tuesday, at the council’s first legislative meeting since giving the bill final passage in July.
An override would require the approval of nine of the council’s 13 members. The bill passed last month by an 8-5 margin, and no member has acknowledged since that their vote could change.
The District's living wage measure has followed a nearly identical trajectory to a similar bill taken up by the Chicago city council in 2006. With Wal-Mart planning its first stores there, lawmakers passed the bill, sending it to Mayor Richard M. Daley, who vetoed it. An override vote narrowly failed.
Wal-Mart spokesman Steven Restivo called the veto “good news for D.C. residents,” saying Gray chose “jobs, economic development and common sense over special interests.”
Wal-Mart spokesman Steven Restivo called the veto “good news for D.C. residents,” saying Gray chose “jobs, economic development and common sense over special interests.”
So it appears we're now in a world where "special interests" means minimum wage workers. Weird times.
Wal-Mart spokesman Steven Restivo called the veto “good news for D.C. residents,” saying Gray chose “jobs, economic development and common sense over special interests.”
So it appears we're now in a world where "special interests" means minimum wage workers. Weird times.
No "special interests" here mean 1 company employees, instead off every company employee. Law shouldn't be based on one company, but for everybody. Why should Wal-mart employee get better rights then a K-mart employee.
California’s minimum wage could rise to $10 an hour under a bill approved Thursday by the state Senate and likely to be signed into law by Gov. Jerry Brown. It would give the state one of country’s highest minimum pay rates.
The state Senate approved bill AB10 and sent it back to the Assembly -- the legislature's lower house -- for a final vote later in the day that will be a mere formality before it goes to Brown, who has said he supports it.
Washington state currently has the country’s top minimum wage, at $9.19 an hour, an amount that is pegged to inflation. Some cities, including San Francisco, have set higher minimum wages.
If Brown signs the state bill into law, it would gradually raise California's minimum wage from the current $8 an hour to $10 by 2016.
In recent months fast-food workers have staged nationwide protests to demand higher wages and the right to form unions without retaliation, following earlier protests by Walmart employees who lambasted labor conditions at the large retailer.
Noir wrote: No "special interests" here mean 1 company employees, instead off every company employee. Law shouldn't be based on one company, but for everybody. Why should Wal-mart employee get better rights then a K-mart employee.
Um, the law would apply to K-mart as well, and any company with sales over 1 billion and sufficiently big stores.
Even if it was just Walmart, it'd still be a very strange new world where 'special interests' was used to describe their minimum wage workers...
Thousands of jobs at 8.75$ is better than zero jobs at 15$.
I know the areas where Walmart is coming as we'll as the areas where the multiple retailers have said they will bail on the district if this passes. Turning DC into a scooby doo ghost town with abandon commercial centers where the primary store supporting the center is suicide for the district. Especially when they can (and do) drive a minimal distance to shop in MD/VA.
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Jihadin wrote: California has a bill in the works to be passed raising min. wage to $10.00. a working livable wage....
california also has really high cost of living and taxes. I would bet that in comparison, that 10$ in California is less than 7.25$ in other parts of the country.
nkelsch wrote: Thousands of jobs at 8.75$ is better than zero jobs at 15$.
I know the areas where Walmart is coming as we'll as the areas where the multiple retailers have said they will bail on the district if this passes. Turning DC into a scooby doo ghost town with abandon commercial centers where the primary store supporting the center is suicide for the district. Especially when they can (and do) drive a minimal distance to shop in MD/VA.
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Jihadin wrote: California has a bill in the works to be passed raising min. wage to $10.00. a working livable wage....
california also has really high cost of living and taxes. I would bet that in comparison, that 10$ in California is less than 7.25$ in other parts of the country.
Pretty much. Penn and Teller's bs did a show on Walmart hate, and they focused on this exactly.
A town in Chicago successfully blocked a Walmart from moving in, because they were afraid it was going to shut down local businesses and the like. Fast forward one year, no Walmart, and all the businesses they were trying to "save" were closed anyways.
I'd link the video here, but since Penn and Teller couldn't do an episode without copious amount of naked boobs, it wouldn't be appropriate.
cincydooley wrote: So what makes $1B the magical line where you get more rights as a worker ?
Nothing, it's just a number that got picked, because for some reason it was decided that a number needed to be picked, instead of extending that same minimum wage to all workers.
It has nothing to do with trying to claim that minimum wage Walmart workers are some kind of special interest though.
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nkelsch wrote: Thousands of jobs at 8.75$ is better than zero jobs at 15$.
And made up numbers based on wild speculation are better than anything!
I mean, seriously, if anyone out there honestly wants to claim that a $10 minimum wage will make companies like Walmart non-profitable, well just, god damn.
cincydooley wrote: So what makes $1B the magical line where you get more rights as a worker ?
Nothing, it's just a number that got picked, because for some reason it was decided that a number needed to be picked, instead of extending that same minimum wage to all workers.
I just can't imagine this will go over well with employees of merely hundred million dollar industries.
Racist old ladies, people with ill fitting clothes so you can see the upper half of their butt crack (please shave if you do this), parents slapping their kids, fat guy running after his kid and running out of breath after 30 yards, people smelling booze.
Perhaps this is only wal mart during Christmas time, but I did not enjoy the shopping experience.
It has been a goal of mine to start up a youtube channel return to wa-lmart with a mic and camera and treat my trip to wal-mart as a trip to the jungle showcasing people's habitats and rituals. Something you see on discovery channel.
nkelsch wrote: Thousands of jobs at 8.75$ is better than zero jobs at 15$.
And made up numbers based on wild speculation are better than anything!
I mean, seriously, if anyone out there honestly wants to claim that a $10 minimum wage will make companies like Walmart non-profitable, well just, god damn.
Walmart is the one who makes the decision to build. If they decide they don't want to, it doesn't matter how high DC makes the minimum wage. There will still be zero Walmart jobs. So how is that made up?
Yeah... The discussion isn't *if* they *could possibly* make a profit, it is that they have chosen to refrain from doing business in DC because they want control of their own business and not be expected to play by different rules due to some over-reaching, arbitrary law.
If DC wants to make minimum wage 12$ then so be it, they can destroy themselves... But forcing iron a particular retailer because they figure they can afford it is not something which most store owners would want to deal with.
Why bother? They said they will cut their losses and bail out along with a bunch of the stores already in the district. Maybe they should pass a law forcing Walmart to build there and then forcing them to be run the way the district government chooses too? Almost as if it was a government owned store...
So it is not made up. I live here. It is real... This law = no Walmart jobs period and the loss of thousands of others.
cincydooley wrote: I just can't imagine this will go over well with employees of merely hundred million dollar industries.
So give them a decent minimum wage as well.
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djones520 wrote: Walmart is the one who makes the decision to build. If they decide they don't want to, it doesn't matter how high DC makes the minimum wage. There will still be zero Walmart jobs. So how is that made up?
Walmart, like all companies, are assumed to base their decision on basic profit seeking. ie if there's a dollar to be made, they will go there and make it. Without one that expectation, the whole basis of capitalism as a means to maximise overall utility just doesn't work any more.
Just accepting that a major company can threaten to leave, not because it is no longer profitable but because they don't like the idea of a change reducing the profit they can make in the area, is basically just bending over, and telling that company that it's their choice whether they use lube or not.
And given you seem to be happy about that state of affairs... well... I know the US has developed a pretty strange relationship with companies lately, with all that job creator idiocy, but this is something new. 'Oh yes, tell me how our minimum wage can be no higher than $7.25. Tell me! Tell me harder!'
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nkelsch wrote: Yeah... The discussion isn't *if* they *could possibly* make a profit, it is that they have chosen to refrain from doing business in DC because they want control of their own business and not be expected to play by different rules due to some over-reaching, arbitrary law.
Same as my answer to djones520.
What really weirds me out is how you guys seem keen for this.
cincydooley wrote: I just can't imagine this will go over well with employees of merely hundred million dollar industries.
So give them a decent minimum wage as well.
Minimum wage is decent, and is aptly named. You get it for doing minimal work. Want to make more? Earn It.
Automatically Appended Next Post: And quite frankly, Wal Mart not wanting to go into DC has nothing to do with their profit. Of course they can afford it. It has to do with refusing to let the government dictate to them how to run their business.
cincydooley wrote: Minimum wage is decent, and is aptly named. You get it for doing minimal work. Want to make more? Earn It.
And, to repeat your own question back to you, "so what makes $7.25 the magical line that means you're earning a decent, living wage?" Full time, that's about $15k a year, and that is a grim, miserable existance.
So when the rest of the developed world pays so much more, more than double that in a lot of cases, how in the hell can you just sit there and say nope, $7.25, that's it.
And quite frankly, Wal Mart not wanting to go into DC has nothing to do with their profit. Of course they can afford it. It has to do with refusing to let the government dictate to them how to run their business.
Okay, so there's another threshold crossed on the steady trip down in to the complete lunacy of the US right wing. I mean, we've all known for a while that you guys pretty much adored Wealth of Nations mostly through never having read it, and so you pretty much forgot that it was 'maximum utility through the agents seeking personal profit' and you just worried about the 'seeking personal profit part'... but now even the profit part has been abandoned, and you're basically advocating that they can do whatever they want, including moving away from profitable stores just to spite government.
That's largely because they can move away from profitable stores if they choose to, simply to spite the government. That's how non-nationalized businesses work. They can make their own decisions based on whatever factors they want, and as long as they're within the law, they're only beholden to their owners. "Advocating" that position is simply acknowledging reality.
I really wish they'd build in DC, though. The fewer DC residents that come out to Alexandria to shop, the better.
Who is "right wing"? I voted for Obama in 2008 and Ron Paul in 2012.
I mean, it's cool and all if you want to make all these awesome claims about America from your island 10k miles away, but laying out your blanket staments about "wings" of people based on some perceived ideology you've got in your head doesn't make your arguments any stronger.
djones520 wrote: Walmart is the one who makes the decision to build. If they decide they don't want to, it doesn't matter how high DC makes the minimum wage. There will still be zero Walmart jobs. So how is that made up?
Walmart, like all companies, are assumed to base their decision on basic profit seeking. ie if there's a dollar to be made, they will go there and make it. Without one that expectation, the whole basis of capitalism as a means to maximise overall utility just doesn't work any more.
Just accepting that a major company can threaten to leave, not because it is no longer profitable but because they don't like the idea of a change reducing the profit they can make in the area, is basically just bending over, and telling that company that it's their choice whether they use lube or not.
And given you seem to be happy about that state of affairs... well... I know the US has developed a pretty strange relationship with companies lately, with all that job creator idiocy, but this is something new. 'Oh yes, tell me how our minimum wage can be no higher than $7.25. Tell me! Tell me harder!'
What's even more bizare is thinking that Walmart leaving would suddenly equal no jobs at all.
In a free market economy, if there's a buck to be made and a commercial hole to fill, people will usually fill it. If Walmart suddenly decided to close their store because now they can only make $1000 a week profit instead of $1500, somebody else will come along and open up an equivalent store for that $1000 profit.
And let's be honest, a state' economy rarely revolves around the wages of a supermarket employee. If that means that there's a three month period whilst a Wal-mart closes and a K-mart opens in its exact location selling the the same products, such is life. It won't really hurt the state.
Of course, the reality is that Walmart will either accept the cost of doing business in this state and earn the $1000 profit, or risk raising prices overall by 2% or something to maintain the same level of profit.
Or they'll simply maintain stores in the surrounding area and force people that want to shop at Walmart for bargain prices and blue light specials to come to them.
djones520 wrote: Walmart is the one who makes the decision to build. If they decide they don't want to, it doesn't matter how high DC makes the minimum wage. There will still be zero Walmart jobs. So how is that made up?
Walmart, like all companies, are assumed to base their decision on basic profit seeking. ie if there's a dollar to be made, they will go there and make it. Without one that expectation, the whole basis of capitalism as a means to maximise overall utility just doesn't work any more.
Just accepting that a major company can threaten to leave, not because it is no longer profitable but because they don't like the idea of a change reducing the profit they can make in the area, is basically just bending over, and telling that company that it's their choice whether they use lube or not.
And given you seem to be happy about that state of affairs... well... I know the US has developed a pretty strange relationship with companies lately, with all that job creator idiocy, but this is something new. 'Oh yes, tell me how our minimum wage can be no higher than $7.25. Tell me! Tell me harder!'
What's even more bizare is thinking that Walmart leaving would suddenly equal no jobs at all.
In a free market economy, if there's a buck to be made and a commercial hole to fill, people will usually fill it. If Walmart suddenly decided to close their store because now they can only make $1000 a week profit instead of $1500, somebody else will come along and open up an equivalent store for that $1000 profit.
And let's be honest, a state' economy rarely revolves around the wages of a supermarket employee. If that means that there's a three month period whilst a Wal-mart closes and a K-mart opens in its exact location selling the the same products, such is life. It won't really hurt the state.
Of course, the reality is that Walmart will either accept the cost of doing business in this state and earn the $1000 profit, or risk raising prices overall by 2% or something to maintain the same level of profit.
Because that's how capitalism tends to work.
Considering you know nothing about what is actually going on in DC... these places Walmart is building are literally wrecked, abandon, dead apartment buildings and strip malls. *NO ONE* is going to build there, it has been available for years and no one has. This is not a nice happy pre-built store ready for anyone to move in. It is a huge undertaking. No one but walmart is willing to attempt to renew these urban areas. If Walmart doesn't, they stay dumpy wrecks. Walmart is literally rebuilding DC with this initiative and the counsel took a huge gak on them. If another company wants to build their stores and pay 12$ an hour, more power to them. No one is going to do it. This is walmart literally stopping construction and walking away. No other company is going to 'fill the void in the market'. That is the whole point. None of these businesses would come to the craphole which is DC and Walmart said "we will build 6 stores and help revitalize DC."
And DC is not a state. It is a City with a failed government who relies of heavy federal subsidies to keep the lights on. If DC wants to increase minimum wage, then they should do it. They already have the highest minimum wage in 100 miles. The city knows that if they did it for the whole city, everyone would hop over to MD/VA and abandon DC, they already pretty much are.
I have to agree with the Mayor:
“Instead of creating higher-paying entry-level retail jobs for lower–skilled District residents, at best the bill will create a very small number of higher-paying jobs, many of which will go to higher-skilled Maryland and Virginia residents who will commute into the District,” he contends. “Meanwhile, I am convinced more retailers will open stores just outside the District’s borders, where labor costs would be more than 40% cheaper for large, non-union retailers.”
“Instead of these arbitrary and partial attempts at insisting on living wages for only certain workers and certain sectors, I propose that we raise the minimum wage for all District residents,” writes Vincent.
The bill hurts DC residents, does not help the rebuilding of the areas at all and does nothing to help DC people get paid more due to the way the DC/MD/VA works and the alternative is 'build over the line'. The other issue is unionized 'big box' stores still get to pay their employees minimum wage (which they do). So it is creating an unfair imbalance in the marketplace to have one store arbitrarily forced to pay workers more over their direct competitors.
Even Proponents of the bill think 12.50 is too high. Let's see if they can actually do something about the district-wide minimum wage, it won't be 12.50 but if they want to raise it more than it is now, more power to them, but the risk is losing commerce to the 7.25 neighbors on both sides.
I won't pretend to have an indepth knowledge of the States.
But correct me if I'm wrong, but Walmart sells the essentials, yes? If you go to the most deprived parts of England, if a supermarket there chooses the shut down, it'll be replaced by next week. Because essentials aren't luxury goods, there's always a need for them, and people will always pay for them.
As a result, speculation is reduced to a minimum. You KNOW you'll get a return on your investment, because people HAVE to shop with you to fill the pantry in the cheapest way possible. Which means that if Tesco/Sainsbury's/Asda (UK branch of Walmart) leave, one of the others will be moving in to replace them within days. Because they know they can turn a profit.
If Walmart's store profits are reduced by 30% (from $1500), that still means a decent profit is being made. Walmart choosing to boycott an area imposes no such restrictions on other businesses who will most likely be happy to get that total $1000 profit a week.
If this is not the case in the US, I'd be absolutely fascinated for you to explain to me how people make do without local food shops, and why no more big chain food shops will move in if one leaves.
i work 50 hours a week working nights at a gas station making 8.50 a hour yet i still pay rent on a 5 bedroom house , car payments, bills , food , other things needed to survive. as well as being able to spend about 200-300 a month on war gaming and still put a little in the bank to save. sometimes its not how much you get paid unless making below min. wage. ( unless you are doing some crazy job or really hard work) which walmart is not hard work its how you manage you'r finances. Its not a easy thing to do and can take about 4 months to get it going on a smooth path. the company has every right to fire anyone which would bring harm to its company ( i hate Walmart though).
We want them to change. We want them to start treating their associates fairly and give them the ability to support their families. When you get a full-time job, you get that to be able to have a house or home and support your family," she said. "You can't do that at Walmart."
My brother works full time at Walmart he unloads the trucks and has a house he lives by himself. Again managing finances allows you to do this and not blowing money on crap .
No, Walmart doesn't sell "essentials" they sell everything. Primarily they are *not* supermarkets. Super markets are heavily unionized.
Walmart has super centers which combine a full service supermarket into their "everything else" store which is clothing, electronics, toys, hardware, garden. Supermarkets don't want anyone selling food like a market without being in a union.
The district has supermarkets, they don't have walmarts. They have individual stores.
You keep saying "someone will move in" but 20 years proves you wrong. These are wrecks that are being torn down and rebuilt by Walmart to build more than a store, they build a whole commerce center in coordination with the city. No one else wants to build there. No other business has the resources to build 6 stores all at once in DC.
Walmart is doing this in DC for political reasons. They have hundreds of stores in every city in America, but not a damn one in our nations capital? Really? They are doing this to break in to DC and politically position in an area which hates them and passes Walmart specific legislation banning them. And the payola is urban renewal. It is a win-win because no one else was willing or able to build these stores.
And some council members thought they would pull a fast one figuring "ah, they mostly done building, they won't pull out." And passed a law forcing only Walmart to pay 12.50 while the unionized supermarkets can continue to pay minimum wage and have an unfair advantage in the marketplace.
What other industry would the government be allowed to come in and say " we don't like you, you have to have a higher overhead while your competitors don't."
Also, considering the district is small, it is no big deal to hop over the line to do all your shopping on the weekend, which is what happens now. Walmart is getting their money... This building was all to make some inroads to the nations capital and contribute to revitalizing some much needed areas.
If you knew the local economics and politics, you would see this is bs, hence why the mayor vetoed it. Even he wants higher minimum wage, but this law was garbage.
nkelsch wrote: No, Walmart doesn't sell "essentials" they sell everything. Primarily they are *not* supermarkets. Super markets are heavily unionized.
Walmart has super centers which combine a full service supermarket into their "everything else" store which is clothing, electronics, toys, hardware, garden. Supermarkets don't want anyone selling food like a market without being in a union.
Walmart U.S. - 4,092 total units
Discount stores (539)
Supercenters (3,211)
Supermarkets1 (316)
So, you say "primarily" they are not supermarkets, but in fact the overwhelming majority of Walmarts have a supermarket in them.While I agree Walmart is not a supermarket, they are most certainly in the same business.
nkelsch wrote: What other industry would the government be allowed to come in and say " we don't like you, you have to have a higher overhead while your competitors don't."
What other industry causes a local tax drain via the state benefits paid to such a large percentage of their employees on that scale? That cuts both ways.
cincydooley wrote: Who is "right wing"? I voted for Obama in 2008 and Ron Paul in 2012.
I mean, it's cool and all if you want to make all these awesome claims about America from your island 10k miles away, but laying out your blanket staments about "wings" of people based on some perceived ideology you've got in your head doesn't make your arguments any stronger.
Oh snap!
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Ketara wrote: I won't pretend to have an indepth knowledge of the States.
But correct me if I'm wrong, but Walmart sells the essentials, yes? If you go to the most deprived parts of England, if a supermarket there chooses the shut down, it'll be replaced by next week. Because essentials aren't luxury goods, there's always a need for them, and people will always pay for them.
You are wrong, extremely wrong. Forgetting rural areas for the moement, there are multiple urban areas where if a major shopping center anchor goes away the center dies and it is not replaced. Seriously I can't believe you don't have this situation in lower class areas in the UK.
nkelsch wrote:Thousands of jobs at 8.75$ is better than zero jobs at 15$.
That's a myth. The fact is that walmart would still be profitable paying their employees $15/hour, they'd just not be as profitable. Lest you forget, the Waltons are the richest family on earth, and they didn't get that way by thinking about anyone except themselves.
I know the areas where Walmart is coming as we'll as the areas where the multiple retailers have said they will bail on the district if this passes.
There's two things going on there. One - yes, it is unrealistic for any single town to make such rules, because a company can go outside the town line, avoiding the rule with minimal impact to their sales.
But, two, there's also posturing. Like the douchebag from Papa John's Pizza (who lives in a castle) saying that he'd have to fire people if Obamacare passed. Meaningless drivel from a self-important windbag.
not sure wrote:
A town in Chicago successfully blocked a Walmart from moving in, because they were afraid it was going to shut down local businesses and the like. Fast forward one year, no Walmart, and all the businesses they were trying to "save" were closed anyways.
That's because Walmart built the next town over. So the town that banned the Walmart, their businesses were still hurt, but that town also didn't get a tax base from the Walmart, while the next town benefitted. You can't get meaningful results from any town-level action. At worst, anything done must be done at a state level, and at best (to avoid the just-over-state-lines trick) at a national level.
sebster wrote:What really weirds me out is how you guys seem keen for this.
Yup, well, that's the big trick that the elite have pulled on this country. I think John Steinbeck summed it up: "“Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.”. There are a lot of people who would rather look at the colour of Obama's skin than realize that they're the ones being screwed over by so-called Conservative economic policies.
nkelsch wrote:Thousands of jobs at 8.75$ is better than zero jobs at 15$.
That's a myth. The fact is that walmart would still be profitable paying their employees $15/hour, they'd just not be as profitable. Lest you forget, the Waltons are the richest family on earth, and they didn't get that way by thinking about anyone except themselves.
No one is saying that they wouldn't still be profitable, what people are saying is that they wouldn't be as profitable and that the company apparently thinks that it isn't worth the hassle and expense to make the investment if they are going to get reduced profits as a result...
cincydooley wrote: Who is "right wing"? I voted for Obama in 2008 and Ron Paul in 2012.
I mean, it's cool and all if you want to make all these awesome claims about America from your island 10k miles away, but laying out your blanket staments about "wings" of people based on some perceived ideology you've got in your head doesn't make your arguments any stronger.
Who gives a gak who you voted for? Unless you made your arguments up on the spot (in which case we've got a whole other set of problems to go through), what you typed comes straight out of the 'free market huzzah' camp. And that's a camp that, over a period of 15 to 20 years has steadily drifted away from the sound, basic economic reasons for economic liberty, and more and more towards rationalising every choice made by large companies, for whatever stupid, non-economic reason they can think of.
And that's something I can tell you whether I live here or over there.
And you didn't actually bother to address the economic problems I raised in your arguments.
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Seaward wrote: That's largely because they can move away from profitable stores if they choose to, simply to spite the government. That's how non-nationalized businesses work. They can make their own decisions based on whatever factors they want, and as long as they're within the law, they're only beholden to their owners. "Advocating" that position is simply acknowledging reality.
That's true, and recognising it is one thing, but we'd be kidding ourselves if we pretended that was all cincydooley and nkelsch were doing. There was no 'it'd be nice but minimum wage has to be raised federally, otherwise individual states will lose business...'
And if it is recognised, then it should be recognised as a problem, and one that therefore comes with solutions. Refocusing on federal minimum wage, or giving incentives to businesses sensitive to minimum wage increases... stuff like that. Instead we got this;
"it is that they have chosen to refrain from doing business in DC because they want control of their own business and not be expected to play by different rules due to some over-reaching, arbitrary law."
and this;
"Minimum wage is decent, and is aptly named. You get it for doing minimal work."
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Ketara wrote: What's even more bizare is thinking that Walmart leaving would suddenly equal no jobs at all.
Yeah, really good point.
What's hilarious about this kind of nonsense is how business is assumed to be an amazing force that can conquer all, until someone suggests a policy that might impact business profits, then suddenly business is this tragic flower that will shrivel up and die if its faced with any kind of opposition.
nkelsch wrote:Thousands of jobs at 8.75$ is better than zero jobs at 15$.
That's a myth. The fact is that walmart would still be profitable paying their employees $15/hour, they'd just not be as profitable. Lest you forget, the Waltons are the richest family on earth, and they didn't get that way by thinking about anyone except themselves.
No one is saying that they wouldn't still be profitable, what people are saying is that they wouldn't be as profitable and that the company apparently thinks that it isn't worth the hassle and expense to make the investment if they are going to get reduced profits as a result...
Right, they will decide whether it is profitable enough.
One thing I see that is really wierd about US Capitalism is that Profitable companies are always getting squeezed and hollered at by Shareholders because they are not profitable enough! Then, the company in response to these demands to constantly make more, and more, and more money and ROI is to lay-off workers, automate, trim the fat, etc Meanshilw, the "business leaders" wonder why Demand has fallen and people can't buy their products anymore. The entire idea is just kind of stupid, nothing can constantly grow forever. (Note: Waiting for examples about the Universe after the Big Bang)
When companies try to meet these unrealistic demands, they start doing things that actually hurt themselves in the long run in favor of the short term buck to shut-up a bunch of Wall Street analysts for the next Quarter. Its just stupid, since the shareholders will literally come and go by the second in our new electronic trading world. They have no interest in the "healthy" of the company.
Does fiduciary responsibility apply only for the next quarter/reporting period? Somewhere along the line our view on what Capitalism means got really, really, really warped. That or I never really understood it, which is possible too.
Redbeard wrote: Yup, well, that's the big trick that the elite have pulled on this country. I think John Steinbeck summed it up: "“Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.”. There are a lot of people who would rather look at the colour of Obama's skin than realize that they're the ones being screwed over by so-called Conservative economic policies.
Well. You seem to, as you're the one tossing around "right wing" whenever it suits your fancy.
Quite frankly, there shouldn't be a federal wage, and for two major reasons.
1. A competitive free market will dictate what your work is worth.
2. Declaring a federal minimum is outside the scope of power for the federal government; if anything, that authority should fall to the individual state and perhaps even local municipalities. Why? Because a blanket minimum wage for the entire nation doesn't consider cost of living at all. Hell, according MITs living wage calculator, minimum wage pretty much coveres a living wage for a single adult AND a traditional family unit of 2 adults and a child where I live.
cincydooley wrote: 2. Declaring a federal minimum is outside the scope of power for the federal government; if anything, that authority should fall to the individual state and perhaps even local municipalities.
There were 9 guys who disagreed with you on this in 1941.
Lovechunks wrote: i work 50 hours a week working nights at a gas station making 8.50 a hour yet i still pay rent on a 5 bedroom house , car payments, bills , food , other things needed to survive. as well as being able to spend about 200-300 a month on war gaming and still put a little in the bank to save. sometimes its not how much you get paid unless making below min. wage. ( unless you are doing some crazy job or really hard work) which walmart is not hard work its how you manage you'r finances. Its not a easy thing to do and can take about 4 months to get it going on a smooth path. the company has every right to fire anyone which would bring harm to its company ( i hate Walmart though).
We want them to change. We want them to start treating their associates fairly and give them the ability to support their families. When you get a full-time job, you get that to be able to have a house or home and support your family," she said. "You can't do that at Walmart."
My brother works full time at Walmart he unloads the trucks and has a house he lives by himself. Again managing finances allows you to do this and not blowing money on crap .
yeah exactly, but the unfortunetly all the socialists who cant see how pink they are in the mirror, still want to tell other people, what to do with their money/company.
its 100% as you said, its all budgeting, and even on minimum wage you can LIVE (it IS a living wage) and save and have enough for some wants on top of your needs.
Its all the people who live beyond their means, or simply want more then their job provides, that seem to have a huge issue with this.
No one is stopping anyone from getting a better job except themselves, if you, and I, and plenty of other people in this thread who have ACTUALLY worked our way up from minimum wage (or still earn it) can ENJOY life and have what we need, and some of what we want, then that is in fact a living wage.
Automatically Appended Next Post: So funny to hear people say its ok for workers to want more $, but not ok for walmart to want more $...
why on earth would investors invest a lot of money, and operate at a loss for a while till the investment is recouped (if it is, its not guaranteed) for less then they feel it is worth?
some people just dont seem to get that someone, be it a board of investors, shareholders, or whatever, who invests a large amount of money in a business, is taking a risk with a large amount of money, and creating jobs... they SHOULD be rewarded, and if they dont like the reward, they dont have to take the risk.
meanwhile, min wage workers take no rish, have no real skills, and do a very easy job, so their reward is proportional.
dont like min wage?
dont work for it.
but plenty of people are happy to make it/have made it and do just fine, and can afford all they need and SOME of what they want with proper budgeting.
yeah exactly, but the unfortunetly all the socialists who cant see how pink they are in the mirror, still want to tell other people, what to do with their money/company.
.
Yeah exactly. It's all the Social Darwinists who can't see the black shirts they are wearing in the mirror, still want to tell other people what to do with their money/company.
cincydooley wrote: 2. Declaring a federal minimum is outside the scope of power for the federal government; if anything, that authority should fall to the individual state and perhaps even local municipalities.
There were 9 guys who disagreed with you on this in 1941.
Was this before or after Roosevlet threatened to pack the SCOTUS with fifteen members in the Midnight Massacre as my old prof used to call it?
yeah exactly, but the unfortunetly all the socialists who cant see how pink they are in the mirror, still want to tell other people, what to do with their money/company.
.
Yeah exactly. It's all the Social Darwinists who can't see the black shirts they are wearing in the mirror, still want to tell other people what to do with their money/company.
There is always someone telling people what to do with their money. This debate isn't about whether there should be a minimum wage - that's long passed. It isn't about whether there should be an income tax - that's long passed too.
The question is, instead, what these values should be. Over the last 30 years, the wealthy elite in the US have lobbied, hard, to change these values (or, in the case of minimum wage, to not change it to keep pace with inflation) in their favour. Then, they've managed to convince you that it's natural for it to be this way, and that any change to the current settings would break the world. That's complete BS, and you guys (who, I'm assuming are not part of the 1%) have fallen for it. You've been convinced that a system designed to move the wealth of the country into the pockets of people who are already wealthy is natural, and that the enemy is the guy who is making minimum wage, not the CEO making 400 times the amount of the guys he's laying off.
Look at the historical data. This country was at its strongest when there was a strong middle class. When minimum wage was not below the poverty line, and when the wealthiest citizens paid a substantially higher portion in taxes. Whenever wealth distribution is as skewed as it is today, bad things have happened. Saying it isn't government's place to address this is simple ignorance that it was government's actions that caused this.
cincydooley wrote: 2. Declaring a federal minimum is outside the scope of power for the federal government; if anything, that authority should fall to the individual state and perhaps even local municipalities.
There were 9 guys who disagreed with you on this in 1941.
And that's fine. There are a bunch of people that agreed to title 9 as well in the name of fairness. Doesn't mean I agree with it. Plus, it was in 1941, or 100 million people ago. I mean, there are plenty of people that advocate against the 2nd ammendment and use that argument. And those that say the lessons in the bible are too antiquated for today because they were written so long ago.
Do you honestly not think that the state knows its constituency better than the fed? Because I don't. Give that power back to the state, and then stipulate that, I don't know, it has to be the median county living wage for your particular state for a single adult based on the MIT calculator. Not some arbitrary number.
I mean, I still have a huge problem with what we're calling a living wage. How many people are we expecting this "living wage" and in this scenario minimum wage, to support?
cincydooley wrote: Do you honestly not think that the state knows its constituency better than the fed?
Judging by how many states are holding onto their dwindling elected positions by making sure not too many of the wrong kind of people vote; I definitely agree that states know their constituents well while similarly feeling they often need a strong federal government to curb their excesses.
Of course, as the DC story shows, states are totally free to come up with their own minimum wages in excess of the current wage.
yeah exactly, but the unfortunetly all the socialists who cant see how pink they are in the mirror, still want to tell other people, what to do with their money/company.
.
Yeah exactly. It's all the Social Darwinists who can't see the black shirts they are wearing in the mirror, still want to tell other people what to do with their money/company.
There is always someone telling people what to do with their money. This debate isn't about whether there should be a minimum wage - that's long passed. It isn't about whether there should be an income tax - that's long passed too.
The question is, instead, what these values should be. Over the last 30 years, the wealthy elite in the US have lobbied, hard, to change these values (or, in the case of minimum wage, to not change it to keep pace with inflation) in their favour. Then, they've managed to convince you that it's natural for it to be this way, and that any change to the current settings would break the world. That's complete BS, and you guys (who, I'm assuming are not part of the 1%) have fallen for it.
there is far more brainwashing sucessfully being implemented on the "we are the 99%" crowd who seems to think that rich people are evil... cause they are rich...
far more brainwashing to make your 99% crowd keep on blaming other people for your situation in life....
if the "1%" were to brainwash people to keep em down, making em believe in all this 99% BS is how they would do it, cause then the "99%" will just complain about things and expect others to avance them, instead of using sucessful methods to advance themselves.
Easysauce, I'm not sure you should be throwing around claims about who is brainwashed and who isn't.
Both sides do their fair share of brainswashing but that is why we allows discourse through the marketplace of ideas. It is this debate that allows us (society) to try and keep a balance before going to far to one extreme or the other.
Remember, crazy is taking your ideas to their logical conclusions.
there is far more brainwashing sucessfully being implemented on the "we are the 99%" crowd who seems to think that rich people are evil... cause they are rich...
No one said rich people are evil because they are rich. There are many rich people who are giving large portions of their wealth back, people like Buffet and Gates.
Rich people, however, are like all people, in that they operate with a self-interest. It's perfectly natural, and not "evil", for a rich person to say that he'd like a lower tax rate.
The problem is that our government is so heavily dependent on money, that when 1% of the people control 80% of the wealth, than that 1% of the people have 80% of the say in how the rules will be implemented. And, naturally, because of their self-interest, that leads to them getting more of the wealth.
How is it brainwashing to show actual data? How is it brainwashing to show charts that show the wealth distribution in the country. How is it brainwashing to show how that wealth distribution changed as the tax rates on the wealthy were reduced, as capital gains taxes were lessened, as minimum wage was allowed to fall behind inflation?
The single most successful method possible for changing ones situation is to change the rules of the game. The 99% don't have the means to do that, the 1% do, and as the last 20 years have shown, they're pretty good at it.
there is far more brainwashing sucessfully being implemented on the "we are the 99%" crowd who seems to think that rich people are evil... cause they are rich...
No one said rich people are evil because they are rich. There are many rich people who are giving large portions of their wealth back, people like Buffet and Gates.
Don;t worry everyone knows rich people are not evil for being rich, but we also know that all poor people are lazy and stupid. Right Easysauce!
yup, more 99% double speak... if you really think that 99% of people have no power over 1%, simply due to monetary imbalance, you are insane...
not to mention, minimum wage in america makes you top 1% in the world still, so put some perspective on it. (
The world's average income - total world income divided by total number of people - is about $7,000. Still, only about 19 percent of the world's population lives in countries with per capita incomes at least this high.
)
or you should accept responsability for keeping all the 3rd world down, cause you are rigging the game against them right?
I know its literally unthinkable that sucessful people are sucessful, because they make good choices, but give it a try.
your theory that 20 years ago some fat cats got together and rigged the game is insane... so it was fair before that? and before that? if we made everything 100% fair tommorow, would it still be "fair" next week? next year? how long do you think it would take for the idiots to fall below the imposed equality line, and for the geniuses to surpass everyone?
should we continually set back the successful, and prop up the unsucessfull?
cincydooley wrote: Well. You seem to, as you're the one tossing around "right wing" whenever it suits your fancy.
I'm tossing it around when I see it's most vapid concepts get dragged in to this forum.
1. A competitive free market will dictate what your work is worth.
Actually, a free market doesn't do that automatically. A free market simply means an absence of a controlling authority. The market could by a monopoly or oligopsoly or whatever, and have all the associated pricing distortions, and still be a free market.
The term you're looking for, the one that'll effectively price labour, is a perfect market and, well, go read about perfect markets and what's needed to for a perfect market to exist. Think particularly about transfer costs and information asymmetry.
2. Declaring a federal minimum is outside the scope of power for the federal government; if anything, that authority should fall to the individual state and perhaps even local municipalities.
The existing policies in your country seem to contradict that, what with there being a federal minimum wage and all.
Why? Because a blanket minimum wage for the entire nation doesn't consider cost of living at all.
No, it doesn't. But it prevents a race to the bottom between states, and that's a much bigger deal.
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easysauce wrote: So funny to hear people say its ok for workers to want more $, but not ok for walmart to want more $...
why on earth would investors invest a lot of money, and operate at a loss for a while till the investment is recouped (if it is, its not guaranteed) for less then they feel it is worth?
some people just dont seem to get that someone, be it a board of investors, shareholders, or whatever, who invests a large amount of money in a business, is taking a risk with a large amount of money, and creating jobs... they SHOULD be rewarded, and if they dont like the reward, they dont have to take the risk.
Your mistake there is in assuming that a raise in the minimum wage would mean the company couldn't continue to make a ROI that'd satisfy the market. I have no idea how you've reached that conclusion, and I'm pretty certain if you ever looked at the financial return of Walmart you'd change your mind quite quickly.
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easysauce wrote: if you really think that 99% of people have no power over 1%, simply due to monetary imbalance, you are insane...
If they had the power, then they'd have the money. Seriously, that's what people do when they get the power. This shouldn't be something I have to explain to you.
easysauce wrote: if you really think that 99% of people have no power over 1%, simply due to monetary imbalance, you are insane...
If they had the power, then they'd have the money. Seriously, that's what people do when they get the power. This shouldn't be something I have to explain to you.
I believe Doctor Tony Montana said it best,
Tony Montana wrote:In this country, you gotta make the money first. Then when you get the money, you get the power. Then when you get the power, then you get the women.
easysauce wrote: lol... wow... economic theory from movies... really...
No, not really, calm your tits dude. what Sebster said reminded me of the quote, but it's not hard to see that there are people in power that want to keep their power because it's power and gives them the ability to be better than other people, something we've struggled with for the ~7,000 years of society we've had while on this dirtball.
so how did they get to the top in the first place? blind luck I assume?
my point still stands,
when walmart says its ROI from paying workers 15$/hrs isnt enough, thats wrong right? cause 1% hurrrrr
when walmart workers say their ROI for trading 1 hour for 8$ isnt enough, thats right, right? cause 99% durrrr
both are perfectly allowed to say what they will, or will not, consider a proper ROI for their investment, weather its hours for the workers, or millions of $ for the investors/shareholders/ect
Of course not. The biggest/strongest ruled the day. Of course, back then, we didn't have electricity or any modern inventions. Things change. We "evolve"
so reset the button ever 1000 years? 100? 10?
so how did they get to the top in the first place? blind luck I assume?
my point still stands,
What if we work toward a system where a reset button is unneeded? It's not necessary that everyone be making the same amount of money, just simply that the people who have the most money can't use that money to generate for themselves an exponential feedback loop of wealth to the detriment of everyone else?
when walmart says its ROI from paying workers 15$/hrs isnt enough, thats wrong right? cause 1% hurrrrr
when walmart workers say their ROI for trading 1 hour for 8$ isnt enough, thats right, right? cause 99% durrrr
easysauce wrote: yup, more 99% double speak... if you really think that 99% of people have no power over 1%, simply due to monetary imbalance, you are insane...
easysauce wrote: yup, more 99% double speak... if you really think that 99% of people have no power over 1%, simply due to monetary imbalance, you are insane...
...
The 99% have power by strikes and other things.
It's really disappointing that Walmart chooses to fire workers that engage in protest. If they're going to give them more work they can handle at wages they can't afford they can at least give them the ability to speak up about it.
Gentleman_Jellyfish wrote: It's really disappointing that Walmart chooses to fire workers that engage in protest. If they're going to give them more work they can handle at wages they can't afford they can at least give them the ability to speak up about it.
Well, I imagine Walmart has a different perspective on those latter bits
easysauce wrote: yup, more 99% double speak... if you really think that 99% of people have no power over 1%, simply due to monetary imbalance, you are insane...
...
The 99% have power by strikes and other things.
It's really disappointing that Walmart chooses to fire workers that engage in protest. If they're going to give them more work they can handle at wages they can't afford they can at least give them the ability to speak up about it.
Weren't the only ones dismissed the one too irresponsible to let someone know they were going to be missing work to strike? AFAIK it's illegal to fire someone for striking. It is not, however, illegal to fire someone for poor attendance.
cincydooley wrote: Weren't the only ones dismissed the one too irresponsible to let someone know they were going to be missing work to strike? AFAIK it's illegal to fire someone for striking. It is not, however, illegal to fire someone for poor attendance.
Are you legally required to give notice that you will be striking?
cincydooley wrote: Weren't the only ones dismissed the one too irresponsible to let someone know they were going to be missing work to strike? AFAIK it's illegal to fire someone for striking. It is not, however, illegal to fire someone for poor attendance.
Are you legally required to give notice that you will be striking?
Over here, yes you are, no idea about the US. You have a right to strike and no employer can take any action against you for exercising that right, but you have to give a strike notice to let your employer know when you are on strike. Otherwise you would just be skipping work...
cincydooley wrote: Weren't the only ones dismissed the one too irresponsible to let someone know they were going to be missing work to strike? AFAIK it's illegal to fire someone for striking. It is not, however, illegal to fire someone for poor attendance.
Are you legally required to give notice that you will be striking?
Over here, yes you are, no idea about the US. You have a right to strike and no employer can take any action against you for exercising that right, but you have to give a strike notice to let your employer know when you are on strike. Otherwise you would just be skipping work...
My wife's union have told her and her colleagues that they do not need to give notice that they are striking and that the place she should not ask her if she is striking.
If you are not part of a union, you can't strike. They are absent.
If you are not part of a union, you can be fired for not coming to work in most US states. These Walmart people can call it a strike, it isn't a strike and if they are employed in an "at will" state they can be fired. There is no legal protection for "blue flu" only real strikes which are part of the organized labor agreement (if one exists).
Walmart has no union, it is perfectly legal to fire every one of them in the "at will" states.
nkelsch wrote: If you are not part of a union, you can't strike. They are absent.
If you are not part of a union, you can be fired for not coming to work in most US states. These Walmart people can call it a strike, it isn't a strike and if they are employed in an "at will" state they can be fired. There is no legal protection for "blue flu" only real strikes which are part of the organized labor agreement (if one exists).
Walmart has no union, it is perfectly legal to fire every one of them in the "at will" states.
But that says if the employees are replaced, they are discharged. That means fired to me.
And a strike has to be part of collective bargaining, not blue flu. Nothing I have seen shows the Walmart "strike" to be part of a legal strike. (Like everything someone can contest in court, but the law has minimal teeth for non-unionized protection, especially for unorganized blue flu strikes ion at will states)
And regardless, at will you can terminate anyone for any reason. It may seem like retaliation, but because there is no reason needed, it doesn't matter. You are employed until you are not. I don't see how they have the expectation of protection from "at will" as no reason is needed, so how can you claim someone who "strikes" is now immune from at will employment? For how long? How do you prove it?
Strikes are for unionized labor. Outside that you risk your employment in "at will" states. You can't not show up to work and call it a strike and have protection.
Yep. Have fun proving it in court that this activity met the legal thresholds of a coordinated activity, then prove the terminations were a result of the strike. A non-legal strike is just absences. They can claim they have met the requirements of an organized coordinated activity but that is a huge grey area with no teeth for non-unionized workers.
Almost all the people fired had previous records which means it will be easy to show justified firings in at will states.
It is a weak law which has no teeth and requires people with no money to prove the unprovable in expensive court to political leaning judges.
Good luck with that. Which is why you don't strike when not in organized unions. You hate your job, go get another one and just quit.
easysauce wrote: lol... wow... economic theory from movies... really...
The point was obvious enough to have ended up a famous movie quote.
But you only posted that response to avoid coming up with any kind of real response. Because there is no defence for your claim that the 99% have the power, because if that were true they would taken the money.
so
when walmart says its ROI from paying workers 15$/hrs isnt enough, thats wrong right?
when walmart workers say their ROI for trading 1 hour for 8$ isnt enough, thats right, right?
If we could do nothing but stare at press releases then you'd have a point. But given we know about wages around the world and what retail companies can sustain, and we know a rate much higher than $8 can be paid while making a strong rate of return, you have no point.
And think about this - 10 or 15 years ago walmart was among the most profitable us companies, and then underwent reforms to develop RFID and JIT inventory management, resulting in massive overhead savings. More revenue per staff, or higher profit per unit sold are both ways of measuring productivity. And yet despite that productivity increase, walmart never looked at wages above the legal minimum. And now they're claiming they can't pay a higher wage and maintain sufficient profits. And you believe them...
nkelsch wrote: But that says if the employees are replaced, they are discharged. That means fired to me.
And a strike has to be part of collective bargaining, not blue flu. Nothing I have seen shows the Walmart "strike" to be part of a legal strike. (Like everything someone can contest in court, but the law has minimal teeth for non-unionized protection, especially for unorganized blue flu strikes ion at will states)
Yeah, and it's worth pointing out that even within union action there's pretty strict rules on what constitutes legal strike action. Most of those exist for good reason to prevent exploitative strike action, but the net effect is that union power is a lot less than most people realise.
I actually read an interesting piece from a libertarian writer the other day, arguing that if unions want to recover from their constantly declining member numbers, they should support a gloves off approach to industrial relations. Drop the laws controlling pay and conditions, and drop the laws on strike action and other employee remedies. Let employers and collective workers hash out what they can and let the chips fall where they may.
It was, like all libertarian stuff, essentially pretty silly, but thought provoking all the same.
cincydooley wrote: Weren't the only ones dismissed the one too irresponsible to let someone know they were going to be missing work to strike? AFAIK it's illegal to fire someone for striking. It is not, however, illegal to fire someone for poor attendance.
Are you legally required to give notice that you will be striking?
Over here, yes you are, no idea about the US. You have a right to strike and no employer can take any action against you for exercising that right, but you have to give a strike notice to let your employer know when you are on strike. Otherwise you would just be skipping work...
My wife's union have told her and her colleagues that they do not need to give notice that they are striking and that the place she should not ask her if she is striking.
If you are part of a union then you don't have to deliver a strike notice because the union will deliver it for its members, if you are not in a union you'll have to deliver the strike notice and you are correct that the employer cannot ask whether a particular employee if he is going to go on strike or not.
Again, this is how the law works over here, particular details are going to vary from one country to the other, and even more from corrupt socialist Europe to the capitalist utopia of USA. (I'm just joking in case anyone doesn't notice)
In the UK, unions have to ballot their members by post and gain a plurality in favour of strike action. They must also give the employer a week's notice of their intention to run a ballot.
2. Declaring a federal minimum is outside the scope of power for the federal government; if anything, that authority should fall to the individual state and perhaps even local municipalities.
The existing policies in your country seem to contradict that, what with there being a federal minimum wage and all.
To clarify: a federal minimum wage (whether a good idea or not) is squarely within the power of the government. It's in the Constitution. (Article 1, Section 8.) The relative value of such an action is an issue that is open to debate.
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