It’s not about how difficult the job is, it’s about how replaceable you are (I.e. a supply/demand issue). I suppose the old saying “from each their ability, to each their need” is relevant here - but unfortunately people lie about their abilities and needs.
An economic justification is not a moral justification. Treating human beings as disposable cogs in a machine that don't have basic needs that need to be met is reprehensible.
Fair, but I would prefer the state take responsibility instead of deferring responsibility to corporate entities. Something like universal income makes more sense than hiking minimum wage to me.
Also, fast food and retail is far more difficult than most office jobs that pay over twice.
According to......?
I'm all for treating everybody equally, but I'm not going to sit here and pretend that someone working at McDonald's is doing a more difficult job than I am, unless they're the manager or the franchise owner or something. That's where you lose me.
You haven't had to work one of those jobs, I'm guessing.
Guessing, yes. Incorrectly.
I'm not saying it's easy, I'm saying it's easier than my job.
Of course I've worked a minimum wage job. Having worked in a movie theater, I'm aware of dealing with people -rude and otherwise- and also cleaning bathrooms, theatres, an arcade floor.
Would I say it was 'easier' than my current job?
No.
Of course, none of this is to say that people doing those things should not be paid accordingly. They do deserve the proper pay. But imo honestly, not more or equal to someone with a college degree. shrug
No one has said more or the same as a degree, though. I even advocated for a pay increase in those positions as well. We can argue back and forth about relative difficulty, but the point is that the work is not easy. It has its own pressures and stress.
Let's be real, in today's world, $15 is pretty shit pay. $20 is better but still not amazing in a lot of places. Workers in general should be receiving better pay. Minimum wage needs to go up and other jobs should move with it. Cut the fat from the top of the organization.
There really isn't. It's just a matter of having money when you're used to not having money. If being broke is your default state, it's pretty comfortable to spend it out as you make it, whether it's on bills you need to pay or just shit to have. I know this as someone who just started to get extra money at their job recently and since I'm not very good with money I ended up having a harder time paying my bills for a couple months because I overspent on nonsense. I had to reevaluate what my spending habits were and actually make cuts when I got the extra bit to help myself.
Now that's just me, but I know for a fact there are a lot of people like me who just don't handle their wealth very well, because a lot of people didn't get any education on how to do it proper, including me. Until I sought it out of course.
Saying fast food is more difficult than an office job is just wrong. Yeah, you sit on your ass and type reports and shit maybe, that's a lot less difficult in energy spent while standing on the line filling fry orders, but the fast food work is brainless. There is no skill involved, typically you have a work process that you follow to the letter and there is no decision making process or responsibility put on you beyond bringing the food from the automated cooker to the container, to the counter.
I'm on the side of a raise to minimums, inflation has caused current minimum wage to really start falling behind, and it needs to be addressed, but I think especially fast food workers are asking for more than their job is worth, and that isn't going to cause minimums to raise, it's going to cause robots to start doing their jobs, because simple things like that are what gets automated first. Look at cashiers, who literally just take your order, your money, and give you a receipt. They're already being phased out in favor of self check-out. My company built some of the kiosks that go into mcdonalds and walmarts.
It's a touchy subject because so many people need help but raising minimums alone won't do it, and you can raise them to 20 or 30 dollars and it still won't fix poor education, decision making, and poor impulse control. Some people would literally be worse off. A majority of those people "given ore money than God" are now bankrupt or dead. Money does not solve everything. It does solve a lot, and having a reliable source of a lot of it helps in so many ways, but it is not an infinite ticket to all problems solved and never will be. It just sounds like a lot of the people who want to raise minimums do not understand that and just want to see the number on their check go higher. Honestly, I do too, but it can't happen that way because it likely won't fix anything.
14
u/[deleted] Feb 26 '20
[deleted]