Min. Wage Jobs...whats the pointOkay this really makes me HOT. There's this friend I was talking to, just met him, he said he works at Lowes, he looks about my age, mid-30's, and I asked him how much he gets paid, about 8 an hour (not bad, for non-min wage wages, but still anyone here want to work for 8 bucks an hour) Okay, NOW my point...I asked him how many hours he works a week, he says, 20-Hours. I was like "Crap, 20?? Are you trying to get more hours?" And he says he's trying tooth and nail trying to get more hours out of the cheap bstrds, but still they aren't budging. So, to add insult to injury, you have to consider THIS when working a min wage job. 1. The fact it's min wage sucks 2. Oh, even if it's min wage, they wont ever let you work 40 hours a week, you'll be lucky to get HALF that. Some even less. I think I saw woman on here talking about how she started working at Chili's as a hostess, and was getting 6 or 7 hours a week? LOL That's a joke man. I personally think there should be some law passed to require employers "If you're paying min. wage...you are required by law to have your employers work NO LESS than 30 hours week (and with 30 hours I'M being liberal here) I mean, if you're going to pay min. wage...at least GIVE them plenty of hours, it's friggin' lame, and sometimes not even worth it. Oka, some of you might be saying, "Well, find another part-time job" Sure...I could do that, you just better hope your employer can schedule you AROUND your OTHER job schedule. Well in my life, I' ve worked more than one minimum wage (or close to it job). I' ve also worked multiple jobs more than once (once even juggling 3 jobs). So, it can be done. As to your question- What' s the point? MY point was paying my rent. I succeeded in that every time and moved onward and upward every time. Your mileage may vary. In the past I have frequently worked more than one job. It usually was one full time and one part time job but even two part time jobs help. One of them has to be able to fix a set schedule or you cannot oblige both employers on coverage. If one is a service job, the other may have to be in a different type of work entirely. Any service job changes schedules every week or even day and it makes doing anything else very difficult. What do you mean by service job? Like what if I work to department stores? What's messed up is, "Hey, I work one part time job at 20 hours, better get another one at 20 hours, then.....when I wheN I succeed in doing that...Yipiee, I'm still not saving money. I'll be in the hole savings wise for the rest of my life even with 2 part time jobs. Problem is that just how much government intervention do you want? Personally I want less not more. You are right that employers take advantage of employees and skate the rules and this is unfortunate. There are ways to deal with this if all the employees working for Lowes and others like them, complain. The fact is though that companies have the right to hire and schedule how they choose. Employees have the right to decline to accept those conditions. Yes I know that this isn't "fair" to those who need to work and are accepting positions simply to put food on the table, but more government intervention will just cause costs to the consumer to rise and the economy to worsen. Next time he should have studied harder in school instead of partying. "If you're paying min. wage...you are required by law to have your employers work NO LESS than 30 hours week (and with 30 hours I'M being liberal here)" Well, not everyone wants a 30-hour-a-week job. For instance, the typical high school after-school job, the retiree who just wants a little more income, the woman who just wants to work three days a week. Minimum wage jobs are not LIVEABLE WAGE jobs--that is, even working a 40 hour week an individual will not be able to make it on his or her own. In an ideal world, minimum wage would reflect some sort of minimum living standard, but that's not the case.
First off, let me chime in, that I' m all for the legally mandated"standard wage" being a "living wage." You can' t really "make it" on $8an hour even if you DO get 40 hours a week. That adds up to about$16,000.oo a year before taxes, so you' d have to be living at roughly$200 a month rent, no utilities, etc. etc., to have money left over toeat. In fact, among all the people I know who wait tables or work attaverns and bars, one of the biggest reasons that they keep their jobsis that it has "free food" along with it. Undeclared benefit, a mealany time they' re in the place. Next, let' s remember, one of themajor government restrictions about benefits and worker protection isbased on full-time-employment. Wal-Mart made its billions by hiring 99%part-time employees, thus never giving any of them medical coverage andhealth insurance, never paying much to OSHA or to the Unemploymentdepartment, and thereby having a greater profit margin relative toemployee overhead. This is the trick that the corporate jerks areplaying -- make you work up to 39.9999 hours a week, but never let youCOST THEM things like group medical coverage. Since the positionsmostly can be adequately performed by trained monkeys -- I mean really,what does it take to be a Wal-Mart front door "greeter"? -- themanagement and ownership of these organizations prefers to take onfive, ten, twenty people who are slated to do the job for a fraction ofthe time the store is open, rather than one "well trained expert" to doit the whole time the store is open. By keeping everyone at part-time,they keep out of the benefits-provider business. Get it? And,another point, this idea that a "job" at Circuit City walking aroundpointing out CDs ("aisle thirteen") or VCRs ("let me show you the onewith a DVD player in it") is somehow a "career" has GOT to stop. If ahigh-school drop-out can do it after he' s had two hours of on-the-floortraining and bought a red polo shirt, then it is NOT intrinsic to oureconomy. The presence of these workers is almost a grudging GIFT on thepart of store owners -- "customers seem to think they need humanswalking around in red polo shirts; OK, let' s get some flunkies to wearred polo shirts" is about all the corporate planning they' ve done onthis subject. In fact, I' m sure they' re working on putting littlecheap-o computers with web-browsers running up on the pillars everythird aise, so that you can find "aisle thirteen" on your own. If it' ssimple enough to be on a web-browser, why hire a human? I' ll also bet,that corporate brass at Office Depot or Sam' s Club is working on makingall its employees "self-employed incorporated sub-contractors" by someweird legalistic fine-print, so they can take even more of theiroverhead away. That' s what bosses do. (Come to think of it, thesub-contractor concept seems like a pretty good one ... hmm ...) So,if people want to complain about not getting a "fair shake" when theyare working in their legitimate career positions, with full training, arigorous college degree, and an interest in making the world a betterplace with a higher standard of living for all humans (or just allUnited States citizens even!) then I' m all for that. But if, on theother hand, they want to hang out standing upright in a retail settingand call that a "career" then ... Imean, really. I have all the sympathy in the world for a person whogoes to public high school and community college, maybe does a stint inthe military, then gets as close to an Associate' s or a Bachelor' s ashe or she can, given the limited public education opportunities in thiscountry, and then tries to make a go of it in some position that he' squalified for, slowly building up a career on the basis of on-the-joblearning and experience, making a decent resume along the way. I thinkthat person needs our congratulations and support; America doesn' t makethat career path very easy at all. On the other hand, if some moron whotook an Art class at the local college once, and now wants to do weedand play Frogger, comes on here complaining about how he can' t getenough hours at Lowe' s even though he' s never run a power saw and can' ttell the difference between a wood screw and a drywall screw, then ...
A ctually, I know a guy who decided to screw college, and work for Lowes since the age of 17 or 18, he' s now 36 or 37, and in about a year, is going to RETIRE on the fat money he made on Lowes Stock options that the company provided. He works in Appliances (apparently the highest paid dept....didn' t know there were different wages for diff. depts). I think Lowes does definately offer benefits after the probationary period. At 18, I decide to go off to college, HE decides to "stick around" his measely min. wage job, now he' s been there almost 20 years, and will be laughing all the way to the bank, while the college graduates scrape by on Medicre jobs in their field ie - for IT, work at a mom and pop computer shop, that pays less than Lowes. | |
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