Hundreds march at McDonald's HQ over low wages

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Originally Posted By: eljefino
Originally Posted By: hatt
Every fast food restaurant has a sign up looking for managers. And a full staff of workers complaining about pay but not wanting to take on any more training or responsibilities.


If you go in there without management experience they'll make you a P/T burger flipper. It's a ruse. If you do "luck out" and become "shift leader" you get to work 60+ hours for $455 a week.
I worked at McD in high school in the early 90s. The day I turned 18 they had me in the management program. Meanwhile the restaurant was full of folks there for years who could have done it too but refused. Pay was hourly. I wish I could have worked 60 hours. Only let me work 4 10s. What's your experience, since you know so much about how it works?
 
Originally Posted By: hatt
Quote:
where do you get these people now? Who will make and serve you your burger, fries and Coke now?


Stay in the real world and away from your utopia. Always going to be low skilled workers.

Exactly, and well said. There is always a constant race to the bottom for "bottom feeeders"
 
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My experience was from a tire shop, where every service writer is an "assistant manager" and got to be there 13 out of 14 days every 2 weeks.

But lame-o chain retail is lame-o chain retail.
 
Higher skills = higher pay.

A janitor has to make less than an accountant in an office building.
A food service worker in a hospital has to make less than nurse.
Etc....

In any job the workers want to make more money, there is a pay ceiling for pretty much any job in the USA. You are simply limited to what the company is willing to pay for your skills.

I recently posted 2 jobs (with links) that pays over $30 an hour with full benefits.
 
Originally Posted By: eljefino
My experience was from a tire shop, where every service writer is an "assistant manager" and got to be there 13 out of 14 days every 2 weeks.

But lame-o chain retail is lame-o chain retail.
Most of the people that end up running the store started in a store. It's what you make of it. Sure some places are bad. When you see a dead end sign you take another road. You don't drive to the end to stop and complain.
 
Originally Posted By: hatt
Originally Posted By: BRZED


You just pointed very honestly out that "The world needs low skilled folk anyway." That hypothesis is maybe fiscally wise, but isn't it morally rotten? What constitutes "the world" by your measure? Is it the majority of people, or is it the people of means? Let's say all unskilled and low-skill workers elevate themselves through education, hard work and available opportunities. Going by your rule,"The world needs low skilled folk anyway," where do you get these people now? Who will make and serve you your burger, fries and Coke now?
Stay in the real world and away from your utopia. Always going to be low skilled workers.

What's morally rotten is creating and expanding a victim class. I've worked for min wage. My wife worked for min wage. We moved on, because we didn't listen to some politician/activist/special interest telling us to stay in a [censored] job and just demand a couple more $$. If you're flipping burgers you're always going to be dirt poor. If min wage is $20 it simply means the cost of living will be much higher. You're spinning your wheels.


Many people believe in your mantra "The world needs low skilled folk anyway" and they also believe businesses should be able to exist on the backs of others without having to compensate the workers based on a minimum standard. They also blame the unskilled for not moving up, but at the same time gleefully acknowledge many won't move up anyway, and that's just jolly fine, because, well, you know the mantra - we need them. Contributing and supporting such a system and then complaining about the associated issues (mostly the cost to keep the burgers coming) is really hypocritical and what I call wheel-spinning. What I said had nothing to do with utopia but was meant to raise a philosophical issue, which was summarily misunderstood either on purpose or innocently.
 
Don't forget they are always looking to invent some machine, some procedure, some deregulation that lets them lay off the middle third of skilled workers and bring in the lowest tier.
 
Originally Posted By: MolaKule
Quote:
Icahn faults the boards more than the CEOs of troubled financial companies because the boards ignored the red flags raised over mortgage-backed security risks.


ABC news, the bastion of free market capitalism and Constitutional authority...not.

And where were these red flags over mortgage-backed security risks, a risk created by our own government in order to be politically correct. I.E, forcing mortgage companies into making loans to unqualified, high risk people.

In regards to CEO "separation" packages, this is usually a contract between the company and the CEO.


What's this got to do with the unions or ABC?

Your default view may be that anyone who doesn't agree with the conduct of a CEO is a socialist, but the fact is that Icahn, who is as big a capitalist as anyone, is saying that the system as well as many CEO's are working for their own interests at the expense of the interests of the actual owners of those companies.

As an investor, I'm far more concerned about that then ABC or the dwindling industries in which unions have power.
 
Looking at this thread, I wonder what will happen one day when the H+ movement becomes prevalent. For sure, they will have to reduce the world population by 90% for starters. You can eat only so many burgers, and you need only so many cars serviced, pools cleaned and houses painted. You better hope you don't belong to the unfortunate 90%.
 
Originally Posted By: IndyIan
Originally Posted By: Trav
I think everyone strives for more money und upward mobility unless they are confirmed welfare case. In MA there are third generation welfare cases so they just want a free ride.

Well if minimum wage paid more than welfare, there would be some who would decide to go to work for the extra money. I'm sure many people on welfare would rather get out of subsidized housing if they could afford it. Most people wouldn't live there if they had any other option I'm sure.
Some branch of government should fund a $15 min wage trial, in a small remote city and see what happens.
The Manitoba government ran a much more extreme trial in the 70's, where everyone was guaranteed a living income wether they worked at all. Any extra $1 they made deducted .50 off the guaranteed income. In summary, most people kept working, and the greatest benefits seemed to be less healthcare costs, and more kids finished high school.
http://public.econ.duke.edu/~erw/197/forget-cea (2).pdf


Don’t confuse welfare and minimum wage, welfare should be cut by a large amount. Lets call it existence minimum.
Living wage is a joke as is social justice, just buzz words of the loony left.
Ask 100 people what they consider a living wage and you will get 100 different answers depending on their own income.

If someone takes a minimum wage job they do so of their own accord, no one is forcing them, They have to know what sort of lifestyle they can have making that wage and should deal with it.
Bring back soup kitchens and work camps, the whiners will find a better job right quick.
 
Originally Posted By: hatt
Originally Posted By: eljefino
Originally Posted By: hatt
Every fast food restaurant has a sign up looking for managers. And a full staff of workers complaining about pay but not wanting to take on any more training or responsibilities.


If you go in there without management experience they'll make you a P/T burger flipper. It's a ruse. If you do "luck out" and become "shift leader" you get to work 60+ hours for $455 a week.
I worked at McD in high school in the early 90s. The day I turned 18 they had me in the management program. Meanwhile the restaurant was full of folks there for years who could have done it too but refused. Pay was hourly. I wish I could have worked 60 hours. Only let me work 4 10s. What's your experience, since you know so much about how it works?



What hatt says here is 100% accurate. I worked various minimum wage jobs when I was young but I never worked in a McDonald's or Wendy's or Burger King. But I knew people who did work in those places and I knew people who quickly became managers at higher pay. If they had enough drive to become managers nobody prevented them from becoming managers. One guy I can think of was quickly able to become the manager of a Wendy's in a relatively short period of time. He had more drive than the rest.

Where I live there are now an incredible number of beggars. They are all over the place. Some of them look very healthy and I sometimes feel like asking them why they don't try to get a job somewhere. I remember parking my car in a parking lot outside of a restaurant and a woman parked not far from me. She had a nice car. She opened up the trunk of her car and pulled out a cardboard sign, closed the trunk, and started to carry her sign around begging for money. Just recently I saw a young, attractive, very healthy looking young woman begging for money with a cardboard sign near a Wal-Mart Store. A considerable number of these beggars are as phony as three dollar bills. I had to go out and find employment when I was young and they can find employment also.

I worked when I was in poor health. I rarely took any sick days. When I retired I had a huge number of sick days built up. Some of the people walking around with cardboard signs begging for money look more healthy than I was when I was working. Sometimes I worked 16 hours a day and even more. I would not give these beggars a dime.

If somebody wants to call me heartless okay. But I have seen too much.

And there has to be low paying entry level employment for young people. They have to get a start somewhere. Nobody has to work their entire lives at a low paying job at a McDonald's. Because anybody with any drive will either become a manager or else find a better paying job elsewhere. I did not work minimum wage jobs my entire life. Eventually I made a decent living but I was not a CEO making millions a year either.
 
Originally Posted By: IndyIan
In the artificial rules of sport or entertainment, some people are worth millions as there can only be one QB or leading lady in a movie.
I do find it hard to believe that a CEO is worth 10's of millions, it seems to me that you could hire a whole team of bright individuals for a fraction of that, with far more capability for evidence based decision making than one guy... Sure you still need to get a PR/figurehead person, but I imagine $300-500k still gets someone that's quite capable.

CEO's of GM, Ford make more than 5-10 times CEO's of Toyota, Honda ...

CEO's of GM, Ford are 5-10 better than CEO's of Toyota, Honda ?
 
Originally Posted By: HTSS_TR
Originally Posted By: IndyIan
In the artificial rules of sport or entertainment, some people are worth millions as there can only be one QB or leading lady in a movie.
I do find it hard to believe that a CEO is worth 10's of millions, it seems to me that you could hire a whole team of bright individuals for a fraction of that, with far more capability for evidence based decision making than one guy... Sure you still need to get a PR/figurehead person, but I imagine $300-500k still gets someone that's quite capable.

CEO's of GM, Ford make more than 5-10 times CEO's of Toyota, Honda ...

CEO's of GM, Ford are 5-10 better than CEO's of Toyota, Honda ?


I'd say they're smarter since they are getting paid 5-10 times better.
wink.gif
Clearly they made the better choice in working for a corp that pays better.

All kidding aside I could never wrap my head around how a sports figure, an entertainer, or a CEO can make the money they make, but that's just they way it goes.
 
Icahn is not one who has created a lot of middle class "living wage" jobs.

You do realize a corporate raider, one his titles, was to find value locked up in companies and get that money out to shareholders.

It funny, many of the problems people have with investment bankers and boardrooms stems from the actions of guys like Icahn in the 1980s.

I didn't read the article, does Icahn accept responsibility for his role in creating the culture that exists today? The board room protects itself from such raiders by running up debt and reducing costs to the bone, often at the expense of the labor many here are concerned with?

Originally Posted By: Benito
Originally Posted By: MolaKule
Originally Posted By: Benito


...But the bigger issue is that there are plenty of ineffective CEOs and there does not seem to be any consequence for failure. Again, it's all about the buddy network...


So says the Union bosses who make 10 to 20 times what their "members" make.

There is a consequence to failure. The Board of Directors will put someone else in that position who can move the company forward.


Maybe the union bosses do say that, but on the other hand, not all companies with poorly performing CEO's are unionized.

Carl Icahn is pretty sure there is a problem.

Billionaire investor Carl Icahn places the blame for much of the recent corporate carnage squarely on the shoulders of the companies' boards of directors, which are supposed to keep an eye on the bottom line for the shareholders.

"The trouble with the country is that we don't have accountability. The boards in this country are not doing the job, and that's why you have the trouble on Wall Street," Icahn told ABC News' John Stossel.

Icahn, 74, has been called a corporate raider, renegade capitalist and the Superman of shareholders because he has battled entrenched corporate boards to bring greater efficiency to companies and value to shareholders.

Icahn recently sat down with Stossel to discuss a system that richly rewards CEOs while their companies fail.

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Economy/story?id=6610974
 
LA Unions Lobby for Exemption From $15/Hr. Minimum Wage Law They Pushed !!!!

This has to be the month's top entry in the "Just when you think you've seen it all" category — and it will be more than a little interesting to see how the nation's press handles it.

As the Associated Press reported a week ago, the City Council in Los Angeles, by a vote of 14-1, ordered the drafting of a law mandating a citywide minimum wage of $15 per hour by 2020, noting that "the support of Mayor Eric Garcetti virtually guarantee its eventual adoption."

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tom-blumer/2015/05/27/la-unions-argue-exemption-15hr-minimum-wage-law
 
It basically amount to extortion:

The Washington Examiner has a good take on what the union is trying to do by having an exemption.

"Business leaders said the call for the exception exposed the hypocrisy behind the whole effort. ",What we are seeing is that the whole Fight for $15 movement is not about raising wages. It is about pressuring businesses to unionize" said Glenn Spencer, vice president of the Workforce Freedom Initiative, a Chamber of Commerce-backed group.

Quote:
The exception, he notes, gives businesses a huge incentive to unionize their workers, since if they strike a deal with union leaders they can avoid paying the new minimum and thus avoid higher labor costs. The workers could find themselves not only not getting paid the new minimum but also having to pay the union representation fees.
 
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