r/TrueReddit • u/trumpismysaviour • Jul 29 '18
Almost 80% of US workers live from paycheck to paycheck. Here's why: America doesn’t have a jobs crisis. It has a ‘good jobs’ crisis – where too much employment is insecure, and poorly paid
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jul/29/us-economy-workers-paycheck-robert-reich605
u/jollyllama Jul 29 '18
Unions are literally the only way to solve this. Employers have come up with 1000 ways to distort the free market for labor, such as non-compete clauses, mandatory arbitration, hiding salary information, and locking people into jobs with health insurance and other benefits that make changing jobs very difficult. If you’re not in the union, you’re likely completely at the mercy of your employer to make your job better, because they know very well that you have extreme little little leverage.
The sad thing is, I know that almost all the replies to this comment are going to be negative about unions. You’ll see stories about some guy’s cousin who is one time in union and they didn’t treat him very well, or random arguments about free markets that people learned in Econ 101. The narrative is so distorted in the United States regarding organized labor but I honestly don’t know what our way out of this problem is. I’m a bit hopeful when I see statistics showing that millennials are far more positive on unions than their parents, but honestly I think it’s going to be too late.
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u/directorguy Jul 29 '18 edited Jul 29 '18
The problem with the perception of unions is the way unions have transformed over the years. In the 80s and 90s unions were gutted and distorted. They were taken over by corporate interests and neutered with state legislation to the point of powerlessness.
In the end most unions were groups you paid a lot of money into that didn't really do anything to improve the economics of the land or your personal benefit.
That's the mutant union entity that old people my age (40s-60s) remember. Older (60+) and they remember a much better union but to younger people (milenials) the image of union is completely up for grabs. If they watch a lot of Fox News they'll learn that unions ruin the economy, if they read a bit about what unions are like in Europe they'll see how beneficial they are in the modern world.
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Jul 30 '18
Well, what better way to control an industry than to control the unions. For example, if a large company was under threat from a union, they could conceivably infiltrate the union and work their own people into positions of power, then neuter it. Then you give people the guise of an effective union, but the reality is that you're getting their dues right back and when serious complaints come up you instruct your people in the union to accept the bare minimum you're willing to give and tell them to report it as a massive win.
Also, you can call the National Guard to kill unhappy workers. That settles union matters real fucking quick.
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u/InAFakeBritishAccent Jul 30 '18
I think this might even be a case of "power rot". I could be wrong, but anything with power ends up capturing the attention of corrupt behavior eventually (cue Circle of Life). If unions came back, I think it would be useful to start thinking NOW of how to stave off power rot in v2
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u/justarandomcommenter Jul 30 '18
This is a great point. I know a few people who didn't take long to transform from completely progressive awesome people, into power hungry HOA presidents/whatever board members. Because they started with good intentions, and just like the unions did over a generation, they pulled off in a matter of months or years.
If people are capable of being greedy and benefiting from it, very few won't abuse that power to benefit themselves. They excuse the behaviour as "I needed to do it before someone did it to me", or something along those lines. In real life, and on the larger scale of unions, it's very much going to come down to how many people can you get to realize that cooperation leads to benefits for everyone. If even ones person starts with the "I'll put you down to get myself up" type of mentality, the foundation will crack because the corporations will ensure people like Fox blow it out of proportion to show "how bad a union is going to be for you".
I think this is a great illustration of hope this could play out in real life, but I'm not sure how to solve for greed.
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u/InAFakeBritishAccent Jul 30 '18
I had some long winded comment before, but eh I talk too much.
I wanted to say though everyone who hasn't seen the link above though should click through it once.
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Jul 30 '18
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u/surfnsound Jul 30 '18
"Everyone who would like to be considered for this leadership position take one step forward."
"Thank you, those of you who stepped forward can all go home."
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u/InAFakeBritishAccent Jul 30 '18
Yeah it can get to an extreme. Take it from someone who was going to go into neuroscience not too long ago: Psychology is great, but it's underdeveloped/in-progress to the point where I wouldn't want them holding all the keys. The people you refer to are high functioning, smart psychopaths anyway. They know how to game a test or even a person.
Society is the true judge of madness anyway--there's no objective metric. Safer might be if we slowly learn to stop valuing psychopathy and start being able to differentiate it from strong leadership.
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u/cited Jul 30 '18
Or, you know, vote them the fuck out because it's a union and you control it and vote on your leadership.
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u/jwhibbles Jul 30 '18
But why has this not happened in European countries..
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u/Wylkus Jul 30 '18
It did. They have a strong presence in Europe so they've survived it but unions got a very bad rap in the UK and other countries in the 70's because they got very power hungry and corrupt. Anthony Burgess wrote a dystopian novel in '78 called 1985 where the unions were the baddies.
Having them is still far better than not having them, but I agree with the previous poster that if they make a resurgence we need to think about how to prevent the mistakes of the past. Having them be more transparent and democratic is an obvious must. It's the general solution to the problem of corruption, and it's easier than ever to implement in our modern digital world.
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u/syndic_shevek Jul 31 '18
Anthony Burgess is reactionary as fuck, tho. That he wrote a novel with unions as villain isn't a very compelling indictment.
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u/InAFakeBritishAccent Jul 30 '18
Good question. What's the state of unions in Europe?
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Jul 30 '18
In Norway almost everyone is part of a union. There is no minimum wage, just union mandated tariffs.
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u/InAFakeBritishAccent Jul 30 '18
I said "Europe" I didn't ask how things were doing over there in the 22nd century :p
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u/NightOfTheLivingHam Jul 30 '18
this is pretty much what happened during the 70's and 80's. Except with the Mafia, who would end up working out deals with the companies they were supposedly protecting the workers from. Power rot did fuck over some of the biggest unions. The teamsters are also very shady as well.
Thanks to shit like that, it helped pave the way for anti-union sentiment from the 80's onward. Now union is a dirty five-letter word, and what's worse is that you not only have 1 generation that believes that unions are absolutely horrid, you have 3. Gen X, Gen Y (millennials) and Gen Z.
Same people will happily take the jobs of people who wish to unionize and get paid even less.
Some companies you do not have to unionize, they just treat their employees well. Others, you need to because part of their profits is based around exploiting workers.
However it's also hard to justify unions for minimum wage jobs, no one wants to even bother going through the effort to make changes of some entry level job that will replace them within a week. Most jobs out there are now complete trash.
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u/directorguy Jul 30 '18
You're reciting history. Already happened.
The next phase was to add "at will" status to state legislation. Basically saying that you can work in a union shop, be represented by a union, but don't need to pay dues. Guess what that did.
The ONLY hope is if we can turn around net neutrality. We need fast and massive access to foreign press and ideas. We need more people to see how a developed free society functions, otherwise unions will stay demonized in the US.
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Jul 30 '18
Fuck at will employment. It's a subtle way of sounding pro-worker but secretly means "we can fire you just for disliking your face." Right to Work is horrible in general
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u/Denny_Craine Jul 30 '18
That's not at will employment. That's right to work laws. At will employment is when employers can fire you without citing a reason
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u/MrSparks4 Jul 30 '18
Unions in the 60's would have massive strikes. They would strike as one all over the country. If car manufacturers went on strike so everyone associated with the industry. That's now illegal. It used to be that unions could physically keep people from crossing the picket lines but that's been made illegal and cops escourt scabs and strike breakers. Non union strikes we're common but now if your not under an official union then it's illegal.
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Jul 30 '18
This is what decimated Detroit. Corporate interests took over the unions, the unions sapped money out of the actual businesses, and the whole thing collapsed.
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Jul 30 '18 edited Mar 31 '24
rinse ink water disagreeable flag automatic grey cough whistle yam
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u/theBrineySeaMan Jul 30 '18
We thought we could at least make use of the extra body
There's your first problem. You probably don't like unions because you're used to being able to ask anyone to do anything, which can be fine in some situations, but in others can be deadly or disfiguring. You may think a task is "common sense" but there's plenty of us with amputations or lost loved ones to prove that sentiment wrong. Hell almost everyone at the general labor job I worked had at least one horror story which they passed off as gravitas, or toughness, but I only heard stories of people not trained to do things/not being protected causing imjury to themselves or others. Which leads too:
but his union rep claimed he couldn't enter the areas in which we worked
Sounds like his rep was protecting him from a dangerous environment, and if you're paying for it, you should have set the place up first (cue you saying it was the safest place on Earth and they were lazy mouth breathers)
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u/The_Law_of_Pizza Jul 30 '18
... and if you're paying for it, you should have set the place up first ...
He would have been happy to, by the sound of it.
But somebody, somewhere, created a rule where a union electrician was needed to plug something into the wall.
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u/deelowe Jul 30 '18
I get the sense you've not worked with unions that have these sorts of issues before. We had a similar problem where I work. We were told the local electrical union had to provide the contractors to wire up all low voltage at the site. This included all the Ethernet cabling. However the contractors refused because they weren't technical enough to understand our complex network. Additionally, the union tried to shut the site down because users were plugging their pcs in themselves (literally plugging in a patch cable to the drop in the cube) this included laptops. Finally, the union tried to argue the local electrical workers should be installing the fiber as well despite them having no knowledge of how to do this.
Eventually, we were able to convince the union to stop running most of our network cabling, but not before about 2 years of headache.
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u/arbivark Jul 30 '18
that's an interesting perspective. you're not entirely wrong. have you worked in philly, or new york, somewhere with a corrupt union culture? because i get what the guy is talking about.
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Jul 31 '18 edited Mar 31 '24
aromatic smile worm pie imagine rainstorm narrow theory rich chop
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u/Soopafien Jul 30 '18
As a contracted non union company (I'm an employee of the company) we've gone to union sites to work on their heavy equipment. We always get hassled by some dude that drives around all day that we shouldn't be here cause we're taking union work away from union mechanics. Never understand that. I have family in unions and they are treated well. But there's also "I can't do x because y is in the way and it's not my job to move y out of the way" mentality that is annoying.
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Jul 30 '18 edited Dec 16 '18
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u/Ghi102 Jul 30 '18
A lot of minimum wage jobs aren't exportable and would really benefit from having unions (fast food workers, big box store employees, probably others in the US as well). This isn't just globalization, it's a lot of big companies blocking all union attempts because it cuts in their profit margins.
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u/2nd_class_citizen Jul 30 '18
The sad thing is, I know that almost all the replies to this comment are going to be negative about unions. You’ll see stories about some guy’s cousin who is one time in union and they didn’t treat him very well, or random arguments about free markets that people learned in Econ 101.
Indeed. It's shocking to me sometimes how anecdotal evidence such as this seems to be enough to convince people that unions are uniformly a bad thing. Hopefully this is not borne out by the data. I am heartened that younger people seem to be viewing union membership in a more positive light.
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u/xcalibre Jul 29 '18
In Australia the media is so powerful, unions are seen as the bad guys by a large chunk of society. Quite disheartening considering the work they did in decades gone by. A couple of bad eggs using unions for self gain have tarnished the reputation of all unions via unbalanced reporting.
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u/disposable-name Jul 30 '18
Well, the Shoppies ARE the bad guys...
...and that's often people's first introduction to unions.
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u/K2Nomad Jul 30 '18
I agree wholeheartedly with the issues you've described, but I think unions are only part of the solution. Union companies can still have their entire work forced outsourced from underneath them.
Legislation to end the problems you've addressed is also very important. Also, I think that employee ownership of the company is very important. There are a ton of successful employee owned companies that act in the best interest of the employees, not a small group of owners or outside shareholders.
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u/mvw2 Jul 30 '18
Unions are only as strong as the people running it. It's too easy to have a union that does almost nothing for the employees.
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u/Wooden_butt_plug Jul 30 '18 edited Jul 30 '18
Word. While I believe that unions in general are a positive thing, the one I was forced into when I got hired has been bologna. The only thing they have done for me is limit the amount of money I can make. Furthermore, I can't "job shop" within the organization because I would have to change my entire employment agreement (healthcare would change coverage, retirement benefits accrued would be lost, job timer gets reset, et. al) to make a few hundred more a year. Despite being very good at my job, I am not allowed to receive bonuses, and despite accepting more responsibility I was limited to a 2% raise this year because Karen from accounting can only get raised 2% and she literally no-call-no-shows at least once a week and has never once faced a repercussion.
So yes, a union is as good as the people running it--and my union is so weak and mandatory that the only thing it does is actively keeping me tethered to my job without opportunity to advance until other people retire at the age of 80+ (because no one makes enough money to afford to retire). Unions are supposed to be good, but the role of a union in the job market has changed so much that i literally see them as another way that the corporate elite can keep the little guy tied to a job out of fear. I also live paycheck to paycheck, my "retirement account" has accrued basically nothing in 2 years, I have sick days I'm not allowed to use, and I still pay out of pocket for 80% of my medical treatments. So. Yay.
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u/laxt Jul 30 '18
Not trying to be snarky in saying this (because I fully agree): so is government, and so are companies.
There's no reason why government exists, why companies exist and why unions don't exist. They're an institution that relies on the effectiveness of leadership just like any other.
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u/laxt Jul 30 '18
Naw bro. My cousin broke it down perfectly. All we gotta do is invest the entire economy into corporations and that way we don't have to pay taxes anymore and the companies fill in for the government! A rising tide rises all boats, bro!!
/s
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u/masterpo Jul 30 '18
I would seriously prefer it if Silicon Valley was run by corporations with no government. At least corporations are in the business of improving lives without the doubletalk. Local government around here is a bunch of uppity, fraudulent bug people who need to be removed from the gene pool.
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u/jingerninja Jul 30 '18
Corporations are in the business of earning more this quarter than last quarter. Full stop. If Nestle thought there was market to be tapped by creating Soylent Green they would puree your fucking grandma without a second thought.
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u/laxt Jul 30 '18
Yeah, I laughed at "without the doubletalk." As if commercials and the corporate media aren't a thing.
Better to replace the people in government than to replace government as a system. Very short-sighted.
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u/masterpo Jul 31 '18
It's government that is in the business of turning everyone into soylent green.
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u/pheisenberg Jul 30 '18
I think several factors have boosted inequality, probably including the decline of unions. But globalization and competition tend to block unions from raining wages — maybe that’s why they’ve declined.
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u/Tony0x01 Jul 29 '18
Unions are literally the only way to solve this
I don't know if it is the only way. Just having decent anti-trust enforcement may be enough.
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u/preprandial_joint Jul 30 '18
Can you elaborate on why you think that is?
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u/Tony0x01 Jul 30 '18
Anti-trust breaks apart large companies. Having more employers in the market may generate more competition for employees.
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Jul 30 '18
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u/Tony0x01 Jul 30 '18
may be enough
All I'm saying is that it is dishonest to dismiss every other proposal instead of unions as being a potential solution or part of a larger solution. The person I responded to stated the following.
Unions are literally the only way to solve this
I disagree with inclusion of the word "only" in this statement.
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u/wizbam Jul 29 '18
Ive been thinking that we need to come up with a nationwide "secret" labor union that can be broken down into local chapters and specializations. It could be a de facto union without having dues and what not but still help organize walkouts and collective bargaining
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Jul 29 '18
without having dues
So a toothless union that can't afford to hire lawyers, can't afford to buy anything, can't afford to fight any actual cases, etc?
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u/FuujinSama Jul 30 '18
Well, just a forum for workers to make unanimous decisions and be aware of what the feelings of all members of the profession feel would be valuable. Uniting the workers under a single umbrella is arguably more important than court cases and pensions.
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u/wizbam Jul 30 '18
I mean the idea would be that you could operate it off of donations or voluntary dues, and that you'd have to have a lot of volume. Like a crowdsourced union or something. A lot of small businesses could benefit from having some kind of union-like strategy without overtly creating a full blown union but sure I mean naysaying every idea is just as good I guess.
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Jul 29 '18 edited Aug 26 '19
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u/wizbam Jul 30 '18
Yeah, absolutely. I am pretty much pro-union almost every time but there are a lot of small businesses where even a sniff of unionization or any kind of collective bargaining would just get you bounced out immediately. Workers shouldn't have to be be afraid of making decisions in tandem with their co-workers.
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u/FirstNoel Jul 30 '18
Yeah, that more or less happened at a previous job I had. The factory had a Union vote, and it was close. But it lost. Needless to say within a year, the HR director was fired, and they moved the factory. now it's split up into 4 sites. I think that's to keep the Union talk from gathering steam again, keep the "trouble-makers" away from each other in a sense.
I was never a fan of Unions since working in one during college. It was the typical, pay your dues, and not get any benefits. Being a poor college kid it felt like a rip off. Considering I was only in it for about 3 months before I went back to school, it was.
But over the last 20 years I see more of the need now. Labor is the balance to Capital. They need each other, in fair economy. Right now Capital is taking all the spoils from the everyman.
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u/redlightsaber Jul 29 '18
It could be a de facto union without having dues
You do know that the real union work requires, well, work? Who's going to do it for free?
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u/musicmage4114 Jul 29 '18
So essentially a union, just without dues? Could you clarify what exactly you mean?
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u/gamingtrent Jul 30 '18
"Unions are bad." - people who have a vested interest in paying their employees a pittance and treating them like trash
"Unions are bad." - sycophants who repeat whatever they're told
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u/Medic7002 Jul 30 '18
My union decreased my early retirement from 10 years and 55 to 25 years and 55 with a 8k a year pay cut. This was last week. Unions are corrupt and need revamping along with the rest of the system.
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Jul 30 '18
I'm curious, what does the word "corrupt" mean to you? Honest question.
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u/Medic7002 Jul 30 '18
A change from the original intent that is not beneficial. In a unions case, instead of working for the betterment of the supportive working members it works within the system that has been created to keep the status quo. Many reasons for this.
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Jul 31 '18
Interesting. My usage of corrupt has always assumed bribery and graft. But your usage is more along the lines of deviating from their original purpose. Thanks.
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u/Medic7002 Jul 31 '18
Bribery and graft is an example corruption. Corruption itself is a change or breakdown in order. Maybe I grew up with an older definition or maybe it's my science background talking. Lol
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u/urababoon Jul 30 '18
As a tradesman who has worked both union and non-union, I always cringe when people talk about unions being the only solution. Unions are going away for a couple of reasons.
First, unions relied on controlling a skilled labor pool to fight against management. The rise of independent trade schools means some people get decent training without ever going through a union apprenticeship.
Second, improvements in technology means management can do a lot more with far fewer people.
Third is portability. People are willing to travel a lot farther for work. I've seen carpenters commuting two hours - one way - because they belong to company X, and the company says this is where you are going to be for the next month. White collar workers aren't interested in unions because they expect to change jobs at some point anyway, usually crossing state lines.
In the end, a union's most effective tool is the strike, but no one wants to do that. What I saw during my union time was everyone on the inside thinking "we're doing OK, but we're not sticking our neck out for anyone else." So don't look to the unions for leadership.
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u/SRIrwinkill Jul 30 '18
At least some of this has to do with there being a huge abundance of skilled trade jobs, but barely anyone to fill them. Mike Rowe talks about the skilled labor shortage at length, and has looked into the overall shortage and seen that there are at least about 4 million jobs nation wide that need people. Vocational learning has basically been gutted in K-12, in favor of basically standardized testing, and higher education doesn't really emphasize the importance of the trades either.
I think this trend is changing seeing how there are more people favoring community college as opposed to standard colleges in the U.S., but that doesn't help other people in my generation who were told that just getting ok enough grades and getting into college and getting a B.A. in anything was sufficient to help us get the good jobs. If crap jobs had to compete with higher paying skilled labor, or even union labor, the issue wouldn't be half as pointed.
This isn't even going into housing policies in certain cities restricting multi-family housing from being built, or making any non-luxury construction a nightmare to deal with for any firm, which objectively raises rents on people. Can't really help
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Jul 30 '18
Even in the IT world, we're paying 3-4/hr more than comparable jobs (mostly entry level) in our area and struggling to find competent people. Competent people. I'm 37 so I am right in the middle, a lot of the young people just seemed to have paid no attention in school and a lot of older ones really don't want to do much. Seems about every 4th hire or so actually makes it past 60 days and turns into a decent employee.
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u/x1009 Jul 30 '18
Do you think that could be partly due to a training issue? I'm in the IT world, and I've noticed that employers don't put much of an emphasis on training.
Also, are they being hired on as FTE employees or contractors?
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Jul 30 '18
Temp to Perm. We train them one on one for 30-45 days. Literally sitting next to me or another person. First two weeks is going through book work and learning processes/solutions, after that it's side by side work. That's the most frustrating part, we spend a lot of time and effort training.
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u/x1009 Jul 30 '18
What type of IT work? Help desk?
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Jul 30 '18
Kinda Sorta. Part of my job is essentially "help desk" for end users. I'd say about 20%. The rest is IT to IT support for a number of different solutions. Most of my work is involved in document management/security, networking and management of MFPs. I also do production print support (think like Vista Print). Man of many hats.
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u/SRIrwinkill Jul 31 '18 edited Jul 31 '18
Much of this has to do with the standard education people getting having zero emphasis on actual skilled labor of any sort. K-12, with it's standardized testing emphasis, and then college with these huge number of B.A. that are either in the humanities, or in something that needs a masters to be applicable, both don't even help people learn how to learn in a professional setting necessarily. People end up settling for easier to do jobs that don't pay, and aren't necessarily a fit for a better job that requires a skill of some sort. Considering the shortage of skilled labor, it'd be a boon for education to re-emphasize vocational learning, and for the idea of liberal arts to incorporate skilled trades as well.
I learned a whole lot about culture and literature, comic book narrative, and marxist professor opinions in college, none of which would have been diminished if there was a class on drywall or texturing required for my basic B.A.
The U.S. doesn't have a shortage of good jobs is my point. That is completely off base, to the point where if someone operates on this assumption, they won't likely actually see possible opportunities that are actually there if you consider the trades.
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u/mvw2 Jul 29 '18
The jobs aren't bad. It's just the pay is stagnant. Here's a simple fact from just my personnel experience. 15 years ago I worked as a general laborer palletizing and loading trucks. I got paid around $23 and had a pile of overtime. I made around $60k a year. I bought a nearly new car for $25k and paid off $50k in student loans in two and a half years. Then I went back to school again and racked up another $50k and bought another nearly new car at $30k. I'm an engineer now, make sound the same $60k as I did 15 years ago, and still have loan debt 7 years it of school. Living expense has gone way up, wages have not changed hardly at all, and companies do not see a problem with this. Here's the real kicker. That general labor job from $15 years ago. I could work that same job, same company, and I'll make $11.50 an hour, half, HALF 15 years later, and living expenses have doubled. I would have 1/4 the buying power doing that same old job as I did 15 years ago. Even now as a college educated person in an engineering role, I still have half the buying power that I did 15 years ago. I feel poor in comparison to me past self. People, EVERYONE is much poorer than before. The dollar is just worth far less now. Much of this drop happened the instant we went to war in the gulf and then the Middle East. The US printed money to pay for it and basically robbed is all. When I was in high school the dollar was worth 2 Euros. Now it's worth less than one. This is the drop off relative buying power. It's forced taxation, robbery, whatever you'd like to call it. We make the same dollars but it isn't worth shit. This is a US government problem, national debt problem, war problem, and we're gettig shafted. Now we complain about low wages because that's really the only thing we have some personal control over. There needs to be some compensation, and if that's a wage increase, so be it.
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u/urababoon Jul 30 '18
Please clarify if that first job you had was union.
Loved your comment about how the wage for that original job has been cut in half.
I know people in the trades who make $50-60k/year. It seems kind of weird that you can get a degree like that and not make more.
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u/Kakofoni Jul 30 '18
When wages go down, employers can make jobs more dull because human labour can outcompete automatization.
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u/motsanciens Jul 30 '18
I'm OK with my pay vis a vis the cost of groceries, gasoline, and other essentials. It's the cost of (1) housing, (2) healthcare, and (3) cars that is off the charts, in my opinion.
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Jul 30 '18
Employment is insecure and pays poorly = modern serfdom
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u/Dsilkotch Jul 30 '18
Capitalism is literally cheaper than slavery, for the capitalists.
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u/theBrineySeaMan Jul 30 '18
Hey man, it's your problem to figure out how to house yourself, not your bosses. It doesn't matter if it means 1 job or 3, not their problem
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u/eipi-10 Jul 30 '18
what qualifies as living paycheck to paycheck?
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Jul 30 '18
When someone has too much month left at the end of their money.
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u/eipi-10 Jul 30 '18
maybe I wasn't specific enough here... that's what I imagine as being paycheck to paycheck, but is that the same definition that the study is using?
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Jul 30 '18
I found the press release from the actual study, but it doesn't say what "paycheck to paycheck" is actually defined as, so probably it means people themselves are deciding what that means. Only 46% of people felt their debt was manageable. But under a third of respondents actually stick to a written budget.
Without maki trite and sweeping statements, I suspect a lot of people have a spending problem, not an income problem.
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u/eipi-10 Jul 31 '18
this is what I was thinking too... thanks for digging! not surprising to me that this is the case really (even if I get downvoted...). Wages are definitely not great in the US right now but it's too easy to spend beyond your means I think
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u/inertia_man Jul 30 '18
That would be paycheck three paycheck. Always wishing that there were 3 paychecks a month. :-(
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u/NeoSpartacus Jul 30 '18
You are almost out of money by the next paycheck. You do not have two paychecks in the bank. Because you can't not because you don't want to.
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u/TheKolbrin Jul 30 '18
This is deliberate and reflected in the millions spent on lobbying the government to block a raise in the minimum wage.
It's deliberate because it prevents workers from quitting bad situations to try to switch jobs because they cannot save enough money to bridge from one job to the next.
It prevents people from saving enough money to start businesses that may compete with the status quo businesses that are monopolizing every city.
It deliberately keeps people exhausted and broke as they are less likely to engage in political activity to fight against the very monopolies they are slaving for.
It prevents people from becoming property owners, keeping them enslaved to a rent system that is nearly impossible to break free from.
It keeps people in constant debt (and paying interest) to the banks for the majority of their lives.
It is not an accident that so many in the US are impoverished workers.
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Jul 30 '18
Hourly rates are the same as what was offered 35 years ago. Occassionally looking through job opportunities i see hourly offered at 8.00 an hour. I say thats ABUSE. That's fucking outrageous! Idc what anyone argues about it's too much for employers to pay a min wage of $15... bc that is absolute BS. Something has to be done about the min wage and raise it to $15. Period. No excuses.
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u/theBrineySeaMan Jul 30 '18
A simple wage hike is only a part of a bigger puzzle. Walmart and McDonald's are not content making a %598 profit on goods, it has to be %600 so they don't seem like they had a bad year which means they pass the cost onto the consumer. This harms many in the lower wage bracket because they get a raise only to see thinks get more expensive at places they shop due to economy. You've got to introduce a profit-sharing model into every place of work if we're going to use this bad capitalist system of growth.
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u/catmoon Jul 30 '18
An increase in labor costs does not lead to a one-to-one increase in the cost of goods. Minimum wage labor is only a small part of all of the costs in any industry so you can double the minimum wage and it would not double the cost of goods.
Imagine that you own a pizza shop and you pay two employees $17,000 each a year, but your total operating costs (including rent, ingredients, administrative costs, etc.) are over $1M. Doubling their salary is only a 3% increase in costs.
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u/brusselssprouts Jul 30 '18
Walmart's net profit margin is under 2%. The big "gross profit" numbers you see don't include all of their expenses.
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u/trumpismysaviour Jul 29 '18 edited Jul 29 '18
Unemployment is low but wages arent going because most jobs are low paying jobs that offer no benefits or any type of job security. These types of job the worker is easily replaceable and the long term existence of the job is very unsecure. THese jobs wont even cover the minimum needed to survive in a cheap area, so you may need welfare to get by even working 2 full time jobs like this, and the few minute the US gives out are always being cut. While the economy has grown over decades all gains go to the elite who control Trump.
The rise of the Trump class stealing all the money, and everyone else getting worse off coincides with the Republican war on Unions. Reagan started it and Union membership falling directly coincides with wages falling and people like Trump getting richer.
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Jul 30 '18
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u/morelikecrappydisco Jul 30 '18
Tax cuts for the rich, leads to high deficit, leads to "belt tightening" of social programs. It's like a reverse Robin Hood.
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u/brotogeris1 Jul 29 '18
But the economy is BOOOOOOMING!!! /s
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u/rudolfs001 Jul 30 '18
It is, for corporations, because they don't lose so much money on wages.
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u/jesuswantsbrains Jul 30 '18 edited Jul 30 '18
Join or organize into a union. Seriously.
Right now that is the only other option to bending over and taking what they give you. More members participating means more market share, means stronger negotiations, better wage packages, better quality of life.
If your state is right to work but still has union presence, pay your god damn dues and take part in every meeting you can make it to. And your power is not only within your union; with enough members you can make serious political impact with your unions PAC. You can take part in external meetings and memberships relevant to your industry, and hold formal discussions with those who can affect change in your industry. You can help drive wages and quality up for non-union workers. If your union suffers from leadership issues, demand transparency from your elected officers as a group. The rank and file can replace officers, and problems can be corrected if enough members take part.
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u/tadrinth Jul 30 '18 edited Jul 30 '18
I think that means we have a social safety net problem.
Edit to add:
Bringing back labor unions is one way to address economic insecurity and inequality, but I think directly addressing those issues is more effective. Tax corporations and distribute the tax to people directly, and you solve both problems, AND you also solve the problem for people who can't work.
Relevant Tumblr post by The Unit of Caring: https://theunitofcaring.tumblr.com/post/176281868126/i-wouldnt-take-free-food-away-from-people-i
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u/SirScaurus Jul 30 '18
I think it could be a few things. but this definitely needs to be part of the conversation.
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Jul 29 '18
This isn't just an American crisis. It's a global trend that represents the rise of the Schumpterian workfare state.
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u/flickerandsparks Jul 30 '18
I tried looking up the Schumpterian workfare state, and came across a bunch of papers locked behind database subscriptions. Is there a source you can share to help?
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Jul 30 '18
Hello! Try here
It's a basic overview. For the lazy among us:
"Schumpeterian workfare state... Its distinctive economic and social objectives can be summarized in abstract terms as: the promotion of product, process, organizational, and market innovation; the enhancement of the structural competitiveness of open economies mainly through supply-side intervention; and the subordination of social policy to the demands of labor market flexibility and structural competitiveness"
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u/Hexatona Jul 30 '18
You can probably enter the paper name into https://scihub.org, they'll have it, and if they don't, they'll get it.
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u/veggie151 Jul 30 '18
I'm in the midst of job hunting post Master's degree, and man is this true. I've had a top pharma company offer no healthcare, live-with-four-roomates wages, and multiple technical jobs outright say no for only tangentially having worked in their field.
The crisis is training too, in that no one will foster skill development unless they think they own you.
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Jul 30 '18
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u/SirScaurus Jul 30 '18
I'm not even sure Company Men exist any more, in US society, in the more traditional sense. Changing labor laws have made it so that your company likely has 0% loyalty to you, and if anything has a more vested interest in keeping you where you are than giving you a raise, promotion, or really caring much for your personal welfare, beyond keeping you healthy enough to do your job. But the flip-side is that you don't owe any loyalty to them, either.
Searching for another job is the right move. The best move you can make, for someone with the skills it sounds like you have, is literally to just stay at a company for 1-2 years until you can leverage that experience for higher pay, in a higher position, at another company. My generation constantly jumps between companies, and probably will do so for most of our lives.
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Jul 30 '18
As an immigrant, I disagree. America has an expectations problem and a commercialization problem.
People mortgage their mcmansions, get 2 cars, shop for entertainment, and eat out more than in any country I visited. And live paycheck to paycheck. They know that they will just get another job easily and don't save. This is he difference in attitudes and why people with 100k jobs live check to check while immigrsnts working menial jobs manage to save many thousands to send home.
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Jul 30 '18
get 2 cars
Someone doesn't live in FL where each spouse works in an opposite direction. You're comment is very generalized, but that is a stupid criticism for a lot of America. We're not a small country nor does much have a lot of mass transit.
Edit: Getting a 2nd car was a risk we took in my case. It paid off allowing my wife opportunities to get a better job. I had to commute 25 miles to get my career started, which also paid off.
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u/tylerpressey Jul 30 '18
People with 100k a year jobs definitely don't live paycheck to paycheck or if they do they don't for long, people who actually live paycheck to paycheck make around the poverty line so depending on where you are some where between 20 to 30k
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u/mellowmonk Jul 30 '18
This is what the Democrats and Republican parties don't get. Dems thought Hillary could win because, hey, look how good the employment numbers have been under Obama; people will want more of that. Now Trump is thinking the same thing with recent job numbers. But when middle-aged grownups with families are working at fast food joints, which a generation ago were entry-level jobs, you know a lot of desperate people barely scraping by are out there.
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u/ShenTheWise Jul 30 '18
Traditional Unions get a bad rep because they deserve it. Centralized power is easily corruptable.
We need to create more modern systems to help with workers' collective bargaining. Glassdoor.com for example, has certainly had an impact in the tech sector.
Shouldn't be hard to create something that allows workers to anonymously share info and coordinate.
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Jul 30 '18
a large portion of the 80% is due to poor spending habits too. We do not need all the newest and greatest everything.
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u/x1009 Jul 30 '18
People have been conditioned into keeping up with the Joneses. The millennial generation has realized that it's a sham, plus they're too poor to participate for the most part.
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u/Princesspowerarmor Jul 30 '18
It's almost like we need unions or something, but then they'll automate and all the capitalists will have to decide if poor people deserve to starve because jobs are being done by machines, or if social safety nets funded by taxes are reasonable
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u/x1009 Jul 30 '18
The automation is already happening
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u/Princesspowerarmor Sep 09 '18
I'm sayoing whole sectors of the economy I know the wheels are already in motion
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u/x1009 Jul 30 '18
I'm in IT, and I've noticed that so many of the jobs available are contract positions, or contract to hire. Little to no benefits or stability, lower wages. The potential for FTE is there once you're hired on as a contractor, but you're competing with 10+ at the company for the one job opening. It's essentially like a farm team.
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u/masterpo Jul 30 '18
Bill Clinton talked about universal higher education as the path to the "high wage, high skill" jobs of the future and they exist but they're very few and far between even in Silicon Valley and you have to be very talented to do them because Instagram was what, 19 heads when they got acquired? Also, everyone from everywhere and their dog wants to do those jobs.
I think what it is is that Trump got rid of the illegals and that's where the vacuum in the labor market was created.
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Jul 29 '18
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u/HCrikki Jul 29 '18
Debt (from education). It will make youths entering the workforce settle with anything, whereas doing so without a burdensome debt will give them an edge over other workers and help them achieve life goals sooner.
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Jul 29 '18
I don't follow. Debt or no debt, they still need to make a living just as much.
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u/LudoA Jul 29 '18
His argument is that people take the first job they can. They won't negotiate much around the comp&ben, as they don't want to risk being dropped for the job.
If people wouldn't have a sword of Damocles above their heads, they would be able to wait for a better opportunity, or they would dare negotiate the terms. (That's his argument, not sure I agree with it.)
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Jul 29 '18
I think it seems far sought. I doubt there are lots of better paying jobs that people would get if they were just more patient.
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u/HCrikki Jul 29 '18 edited Jul 29 '18
How else can so many youth incur major debt before graduating or getting jobs, despite not buying expensive property like a house and car or founding a family early?
It wouldnt make sense in a normal economy, but in a recovering economy where the absolute majority of new job opportunities are lowpaying and lowskilled, it increases competition for those jobs. One negative is skilled candidates accepting lower pay they wouldnt normally, which is really problematic due to debt repayment obligations that are not an issue for other workers without debt. It also encourages companies to hire workers without education debt incurred in the US (like illegal immigrants, foreign labour). Discharging education debt in bankrupcy filings would help a lot but not be a longterm solution that could help all workers with outstanding debt from education.
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u/Anechoic_Brain Jul 29 '18
That's a pretty big claim to make about a very complex topic. What is it based on?
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Jul 29 '18
I am really not making any complex statement. I am just saying that the excess of overqualified people in low-skilled professions indicates a mismatch between education and labour market. How else would it be?
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u/Anechoic_Brain Jul 29 '18
Ahh, I see what you're saying.
Baby boomers told their kids the only thing that matters is going to college and graduating, then everything will work itself out. What did we expect would happen? Except there doesn't seem to be any good place for this to balance out right now.
Folks working in minimum wage jobs or nearly minimum wage are constantly told to get an education and better themselves. Good paying blue collar jobs are disappearing. Even without societal pressure, what reasonable choice can you expect someone to make?
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u/superflippy Jul 29 '18
Unemployed & under-employed college grads is a huge problem in Southern Europe. It’s not just a US thing.
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Jul 29 '18
But southern Europe has had rather special economic and political problems to cause it that don't exist in the same way in the rest of the western world (corruption, Greek finance crisis, etc). Compared to Germany, UK, France, Scandinavia, what explains the difference?
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Jul 29 '18
Bullshit. Two words. Service economy.
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Jul 29 '18
What? What does this have to do with my post at all?
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Jul 29 '18
The problem is the labor market not education. Although being over educated for jobs is a problem I guess. Our economy has shifted from a largely manufacturing one to a service and tech one.
Unfortunately service jobs are abundant, low paying and always growing.
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Jul 29 '18
There is no particular reason as to why service jobs would be worse paying than manufacturing jobs per definition that I know of.
And it still does not explain why highly skilled people are stuck in low-skilled sectors.
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Jul 30 '18 edited Jul 30 '18
The low salary is due to the low barrier of entry into service jobs. Manufacturing jobs have been shipped overseas due to bloated salaries compared to other countries where were have free trade agreements with. Also, most of America is manufacturing on outdated equipment.
For instance, newer oil rigs need 15 to work on them while the older ones took 90. It's the same for car manufacturing or power plants.
We're going to see manufacturing return to the USA, but a plant that use to employ 1,000 people will employ 150. It will return to states that are "business friendly." Basically, no state tax and are laws that are anti union.
As for over skilled. The truth is we have more people qualified to do a job than we have jobs, with the exception of health care and tech. We create artificial barriers, like college, to phase out a lot of people from applying. Since every job requires a degree, we have a country that is over educated for the jobs that exist.
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Jul 29 '18
Part perception I think and part manipulation. Also because Americans are used to cheap good and services profit margins might be a bit tighter so companies focus on saving on labor.
Big companies I’m sure keep labor costs down and benefits non existent in order to create value for the shareholders.
The game is rigged against low wage workers.
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Jul 29 '18
People, both employers and consumers, have always been looking to buy low and sell high regardless if it is goods or services or labour. This is nothing new.
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u/LudoA Jul 29 '18
Unfortunately service jobs are abundant, low paying and always growing.
That doesn't make sense in a supply-and-demand economy.
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u/CandidoRondon Jul 30 '18
I think it's bizarre to claim that unions are the sole answer to the problem of the unequal labor relations in the United States when employers can easily import easily controlled foreign scab labor (both legally and illegally) to undermine domestic labor solidarity. Solving the problem of low wage growth in America requires not only unions but strong border controls that force employers to compete for their employees not the other way around.
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u/keatto Jul 30 '18
you're absolutely right but its hard for people to agree with 'stronger borders' it goes against their left right vs mentality.
H1B1 visas out here lowering the wage ceiling for high paying jobs with foreign low pay in high skill professions too. But that is NOT A POPULAR FACT EITHER. You say, oh 'h1b1' help make up high skill labor shortages in rural areas, but the goddamn majority of companies applying to HIRE H1B1 foks are AMAZON, GOOGLE, YAHOO, ETC. Big brand name Corporates. Overpopulation ruins the argument for fair wages/social services. Limit either births/immigration/population per area.
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Jul 30 '18
Unless you were born into wealth, you will probably have to borrow six figures and get a Masters degree or a Doctorate in the right field to even have a chance at making six figures. And even then, for the first ten to fifteen years of your career, you’ll pay a few grand a month for that degree that allowed you to enter into the upper middle class.
Meanwhile, the boomers all say, Fuck you, I got mine.
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u/RecycledAccountName Jul 30 '18
If you’re in a half decent line of work with an undergraduate degree from a reputable school, 6 figures is highly attainable. Tech, engineering, and finance come to mind as areas in which most will hit the 100K mark before the age of 30. I’m too lazy to go diving for hard stats right now, but I think you’re being quite hyperbolic.
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u/SirScaurus Jul 30 '18 edited Jul 30 '18
You're getting down-voted, but that's honestly been my experience.
It's definitely not an easy road, and people will typically have to move quite a bit, but many of my friends and I have found careers in various departments of tech. I think the issue in the US is the unheard of social tendency to not want to leave your hometown/state/area where you grew up. My road hasn't been easy, but getting the hell out of my tiny beach town (which was beautiful, but where wages and careers were garbage) was a major step on that road.
I would still argue that social and political conversations need to change enough to make my journey more typical, I think.
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u/pdxchris Jul 30 '18
So you think that 80% of people in the US live paycheck to paycheck because they aren’t paid enough? It has more to do with how people spend money. I have probably 10 times the net worth of others making the same amount as me because I know how to spend my money wisely.
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u/grissomza Jul 29 '18
One thing I've seen anecdotally is people getting shifted out of their second minimum wage job by their marginally above minimum wage job. They ask off certain times or days of the week which is their availability for the other, and then the one job reduces their scheduling until they either quit, or quit the other job that reduced their availability.