Date Created: June 21, 2023
This community supports labor, with an aspiration for it to cease to be required to live our lives. Members of this community want to end work, are curious about ending work, want to get the most out of a work-free life, want more information on anti-work ideas and/or want personal help with their own jobs/work-related struggles.
Start here! Some of the more talked-about essays on the topic.
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My mom talks about this shit all the time "flipping burgers isn't a job!", and demeans a shit load of other service jobs. She says those are just for teenagers to buy a car or to save for college (as fuckin if).
But theoretically, if they were only for teenagers and broke college students, you really think those millions of jobs would all be filled by people between the age of 16 and 24? Seriously?
Boomers are living in a fucking dream
If fast food is for teens in school, why are they open during school hours?
These same assholes wouldn't survive a week working a service job. That shit is hard and stressful as fuck.
the vast majority didn't work their way through school either, and if they did, it was a bullshit job, not the kind of dangerous child labor they endorse nowadays. meat packing, construction, logging, they just want cheap labor.
https://www.newsweek.com/republicans-want-children-clean-meatpacking-plants-1782139
Boomers are living in a fucking dream
Meanwhile, everyone else is living in the nightmare they created.
Literal depiction of boomers eating their offspring so they can take another fucking cruise on a norovirus infected monstrosity
"flipping burgers isn't a job!"
What is it, then? A hobby? Are these people burger-flipping enthusiasts?
burgerites. it's their religion, and I'm american enough to let people follow whatever deranged deities they want, as long as the fries are good.
for teenagers to save for college
Makes sense. Average in-state tuition is about $16000 per year. At $7.25/hour, you only need to work 200 eight hour shifts every year to pay for tuition that year. Add that on to the 180 school days, it's just 380 days a year.
Obviously, you also need to register yourself as a subcontractor via an LLC subsidiary of a foreign shell corporation to avoid paying taxes on that, and you live at home, so all your food is completely free, and everything is on the internet anyway, so you don't need books for college, and your college which is obviously in your town is only a 98 minute light jog away from home.
“Save for college” 😂😂😂
Classic boomer logic... just because they could afford a decent life on min wage set 50 years ago doesnt make it true when the min wage has lagged behind inflation and not even accounting for greedflation...
"That job doesn't deserve a living wage" = "I dont respect the people who do that job"
It's people looking down on that work as being inferior to them and their job and them thinking "they shouldn't get what I have". It's a view that jobs are better or worse than others thats been perpetuated by the rich. Belittling people who are not the top earners and making the argument that they deserve less that someone that they deem more professional.
What what these people should be saying is why don't I get more for my efforts , not that others deserve less.
By keeping the anger pointing down, they stop you from looking up.
If you ever find yourself at work and think that another member of your team isn't pulling their weight and that they are getting paid more than than you, consider that they might be, by some fluke of fate, actually be being paid fairly and it's you who is being taken advantage of. Either put your feet up or stamp your feet on the ground, but don't kick the chair out from under your peers because that's exactly what the people who pay your wages want you to do.
The argument is that these are starter jobs and people should expect to move up in the world. Well, that was the case for me, but I can tell you the idea is clearly bullshit.
First off, if these are just teenager jobs, are we willing to shutdown all fast food during school hours? No? Must not just be teens working those jobs then. Go in a fast food joint for a weekday lunch. Those aren't high school kids working there.
And the hard truth is this, some people are just too dumb to handle a more complex job. I'm not talking about education, I'm talking intelligence. I honestly had no idea how many Americans are simply too stupid. Had a middle-aged lady in Alabama last week trying to check me out. She asked 4 times if it was dine-in or carry out. She made a simple mistake on the register and could not for the life of her clear it. A coworker leaned over her shoulder and pushed two buttons.
I've said before, worked IT for payroll company who served low-end clients like restaurants, churches, thrift stores and the like. We had thousands of employees working through us. I rarely interacted with our workers, but Jesus were they (mostly) dumb. The old Carlin quote comes to mind. If there's an average IQ, it stands to reason there are loads of people on the left side of that curve.
So what are we to do with these people? Paying them a living wage is the only possible answer. If we don't, they get food stamps and other government benefits. These giant corporations are taking our tax money so payroll doesn't come out of their pockets.
There are plenty of knock-on effects as well. No or shit insurance? Great. Now we have a sick workforce that's an extra burden on the healthcare system and the employer. Shit paying jobs have shit turnover, and that hurts the company. Most think of training costs, but there's more. Employers have to pay a certain amount into the state unemployment fund for a new employee. Flip that employee and the tax starts all over again. New employees strain everything from HR to IT, accounting and payroll.
FFS, if you pay people you attract better and more loyal workers. And it saves the company money, even in the short term. I've worked for companies that get it, my wife works for one now.
There's a convenience store chain called Quik Trip. Those people make more than a mere living wage. They get fair pay and a cut of their store's profit each month. That monthly bonus can be more than a 2-week paycheck. A promotion means a move to a busier store, mo money. The interstate truck-stop job is the holy grail. They make a career out of working at a gas station. You see people with 20, 30, 40 year name tags. Training is a 2-month class. You will never encounter an incompetent employee, and you won't wait in line. Quik Trip is wildly successful, has been for decades. If you know, you know. :)
/rant Sorry, this bugs hell out of me. I get that many mom-and-pop stores can't pay more on their thin margins. But what about a sliding scale based on company profit?
EDIT: OK, one more rant. Companies would be healthier if they doled out more PTO. From an accounting perspective, they see it as paying someone to do nothing. But the reality is that coworkers step up to fill in. What if employers said, "We'll give you lots of PTO, but you have to work harder to cover for people that are out." I can't imagine workers balking at that idea. Bam! Employer isn't out a dime, employees are happier, more loyal and likely more productive.
Employers have to drop this paradigm that workers are numbers on spreadsheets and start treating them like the assets they are. If you had a cow cranking out milk for you everyday, would you beat the crap out of it, feed it shit food, stress it's health?
Shit paying jobs have shit turnover, and that hurts the company. Most think of training costs, but there's more. Employers have to pay a certain amount into the state unemployment fund for a new employee. Flip that employee and the tax starts all over again. New employees strain everything from HR to IT, accounting and payroll.
I agree with your point but employers don’t give a fuck and factor that into the cost of doing business. I work in an industry with a ton of turnover and seasonal work. They could make a whole bunch of employees full time year round, but instead they’ll make them full time seasonal, skip out on paying benefits, fire and rehire them every six months and pay the unemployment penalties. And rather than hire Americans at fair wages, they’ll exploit our immigration system and import rich college students from abroad as part of a “cultural exchange” on J1 visas and work them six days a week for three months for peanuts undercutting local labor and as a feature of that visa they have to house them too, undercutting the housing market for locals as well. J1s can’t complain and can’t organize or they get kicked out of the country.
So what are we to do with these people? Paying them a living wage is the only possible answer. If we don’t, they get food stamps and other government benefits. These giant corporations are taking our tax money so payroll doesn’t come out of their pockets.
This. If these employees are not getting living wage, and since they are evidently living, then that makes them subsidized workforce.
If you had a cow cranking out milk for you everyday, would you beat the crap out of it, feed it shit food, stress it's health?
Capitalism: hold my beer...
What exactly makes that job, specifically, the bottom rung of the totem pole?
Hell, I liked working at a restaurant. Feeding people is fulfilling as fuck. It sucks that it has to be such low pay.
And why should the bottom rung of the totem pole not offer a decent life?
People like that just want to feel superior. It perpetuates the lie that we live in a meritocracy.
People who want a class system. That's pretty much it. The people making the food people are buying are the people making money. The company isn't making money without them. They should be paid according to the money they make, and that would be a huge amount of money.
You get what you pay for. FAFO ain't a great policy when it comes to your food.
"We cook your meals. We haul your trash. We connect your calls. We drive your ambulances. We guard you while you sleep. Do not fuck with us."
Which why I find humor in how now (at least in CA) Someone working in McDonald's makes more then say, an associate teacher at a preschool. (Agian no diss on fast food workers, just a little humour by the same logic people put more care into thier burger then thier kid)
Jobs in things like teaching and nursing are considered the caring professions, with the assumption that people who go into them do so to help people rather than make money, and thus are a soft touch to extract profits from. It is considered normal for teachers to be paid poverty wages, have to buy classroom supplies from their own funds and to lose money over their career, because, hey, if you didn’t want to sacrifice yourself for making the world better or whatever, you should have gone into finance instead.
sigh yeah....
I realize as a community we really do put more care into our burgers then our children...
Yeah, people retort, it's not a job to make money, if you mention the bottom pay and parents who treat us as glorified babysitters or those who think they don't have to raise their children because child development is a magical art and all we do is "abra cadbra healthy SEL".
And like some aort of masochist too many stick to or get into this field (I mean what kind of sucker still pursues a multi-subject credential, lol, me) because it's true, we genuinely care for the children and want to them to grow.
Yet another problem with our society, and ofc the only time systematic change will occur is when it's tio late and even the most bleeding heart nurses, teachers etc have been forced out.
In Ontario, teachers are paid a respectable wage (six figures is fairly easily attainable for a full-time teacher) with solid pension, vacation, and benefits (the association managing the teacher's pension is one of the biggest single stock investors in the country).
People complain that "just teachers" shouldn't be pulling 100k+ salaries all the time, but the thing is, being a teacher requires about 6 years of post-secondary here, a bachelor's degree + teachers college. On top of that, there are continuing education requirements. Usually once I explain to people that someone with 6 years of post-secondary will often be getting $100k+ in private industry and thus teacher's salaries are simply being competitive to that, they generally are somewhat understanding.
Jobs that “help” people or are considered “fun” aren’t considered real jobs and those don’t deserve real wages.
Especially if they’re predominately female employees.
If fast food worker wages cannot sustain life then fast food is unsustainable and should die out. If fast food becomes as slow and/or as expensive as a restaurant meal then fast food is a market distortion that shouldn't exist. Simple as.
Not to mention ultra-processed foods and soft drinks are costing thousands of lives and billions of dollars of medical expenses per year. We have the fast food industry causing a health crises and a shitty ‘healthcare’ system perpetuating it.
Around where I am, fast food is the same price as some restaurants and only a few dollars less than others. For the most part they are faster though, so maybe there's a point for people to go. Also easier to sit at a fast food place for a bit rather than take up a table that a server needs to turn for a while.
People go out of habit. Honestly, that is usually why my family ends up getting any of them, but we have even broken those habits as prices keep going up. They have forgotten their place.
"Teenagers work those jobs."
"And why should a teenager not make enough to live? You hate everyone younger than you?"
Most teenagers are harder workers than adults I've worked with. Either they are lazy and you get rid of them or they are hard working and usually worth more than the people who are casting those opinions by a long shot.
If you think that telling them where to unload a truck is a job that deserves a living wage and the person unloading the truck doesn't, you need a swift kick in the ass.
People shouldnt live if they work in fastfood?
"Those kinds of jobs should be fulfilled by kids."
And then they'll tell you child labor is nbd... typical of people who didn't labor in their childhoods, they're fine with the poor kids working whatever.
I was involved in that thread, that bootlicker was deep throating the whole fucking boot
~~bootlicker~~ bootswallower
Anyone wo worked McDonald's on Christmas Eve deserves $25/hr! Making those ridiculous 1k nugget orders comes at the cost of humans dedicating hours of their lives to this shit.
1k nugget orders!?
If you have to ask, you have the blessing of likely never knowing what troubles I've seen. And it was my birthday too, never again.
Americans have clearly never heard the phrase
"Never fuck with someone who handles your food."
I do think a lot of food jobs should go away. Restaurants are a huge source of food waste and it's because we have restaurants ready to serve more food in an area than there are people in that area, let alone people who want to go out and eat that night.
The "My pay is shit but at least I'm not a fast food worker" mindset. Or maybe they're just pointing out the obvious situation we're in but don't necessarily want it to be this way.
If McDonald's is making wild profits then the employees deserve a living wage. Full Stop. I don't care if they just open the door, no reason 1% of the company deserves 90% of the profit.
Wakeupwa just likes crime.
People have different priorities you know.
They want to make the excuse that these jobs are not designed to make people money. And yet when we talk about suppressing the power and ubiquity of corporate greed across America, and all of the economic harm that comes with it, all we hear is “but they create jobs!”
I wish there was some CHIM shit in play where saying something so idiotic vanished you out of reality and retroactively erased such a person from our collective memories.
Or maybe a better society that mitigates this kind of outlook. That's cool too.