Why do people say Kids/young people don’t want to work/expect free money???

[SKL]

"In 2022, the number of small businesses in the US reached 33.2 million, making up nearly all (99.9 percent) US businesses.

...

According to the US Small Business Administration, “small businesses” are defined as “firms with fewer than 500 employees.” The report shows that there are around 27 million small businesses that do not hire any employees. 5.4 million have fewer than 20 employees, and 650,000 businesses have under 500 employees."

https://www.oberlo.com/statistics/number-of-small-business-in-the-us

So there are roughly 6 million US employers, and we're using the top 500 (or 3000) to define how US employers earn profits, compensate their top brass, and deal with their employees?

[fraidycat]

14 minutes ago, SKL said:

 

Employers aren't entitled to employees.  I'm just saying it's not that easy for most businesses to pull higher wages out of their asses.  The implication that most US business owners are overflowing with profit is untrue and ridiculous.

As an employer, I profit-share in addition to paying decent wages.  And when I say profit-share, that's before considering that it's my obligation, not the employees', to pay off the debt I incurred in order to make hiring businesses happen.  It's before considering that some of my tenants aren't paying their rent.  It's also before giving myself a penny of salary.  There are many businesses run by people who are not exploiters.  However, can I guarantee my employees that they will never have to work with an asshole co-worker, customer, or vendor?  No, I cannot.  Nor can I afford to pay high wages when there isn't high income to cover them.

Not most businesses, the businesses with the most employees. The ones with multi-million dollar top-brass wages and millions of employees with minimum wage, part-time, no-benefits jobs.

[SKL]

2 hours ago, katilac said:

 

LOL ok - what are you basing this on? Bc I very much think the vast majority of US businesses that employ teens have filthy rich CEOs. 

Top 11 Fast Food CEOs Pay Averages Over $6,000 Per Hour

Wendy's CEO, 5.5 million. Starbucks' CEO, 13.3 million. McDonald's CEO. 15.8 million. 

Walmart USA CEO, 14.4 million. Walmart CEO, 24.5 million. 

Target CEO, 19.7 million

 

Well first of all, that's a 2019 article, before the minimum wage hikes, before the pandemic, etc.

Secondly, the person I was quoting declared that business owners are making hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation, which is not supported by your linked article, even for the very top company CEOs.

Third, it should be common knowledge that there are millions of employers in the US.  The top of the top of the top are obviously not representative.

Among people I know, very few of their jobs were for those big companies.  Most (including myself) worked for small companies, nonprofits, and government-run entities.

[SKL]

Just now, fraidycat said:

Not most businesses, the businesses with the most employees. The ones with multi-million dollar top-brass wages and millions of employees with minimum wage, part-time, no-benefits jobs.

The biggest employers in my area have always been government and nonprofit (i.e. hospitals and similar).

[SKL]

2 minutes ago, fraidycat said:

Not most businesses, the businesses with the most employees. The ones with multi-million dollar top-brass wages and millions of employees with minimum wage, part-time, no-benefits jobs.

They exist, but they are not the majority of the youth job scene.

But young people do seem to be relatively happy and successful as short-term workers at some of those companies.

[livetoread]

5 minutes ago, SKL said:

The biggest employers in my area have always been government and nonprofit (i.e. hospitals and similar).

The CEO of one of the non-profit hospital systems in my area has earned anywhere from 2 to over 6 million in compensation each year over the last five years.

[katilac]

1 hour ago, SKL said:

Well first of all, that's a 2019 article, before the minimum wage hikes, before the pandemic, etc.

Secondly, the person I was quoting declared that business owners are making hundreds of millions of dollars in compensation, which is not supported by your linked article, even for the very top company CEOs.

Third, it should be common knowledge that there are millions of employers in the US.  The top of the top of the top are obviously not representative.

Among people I know, very few of their jobs were for those big companies.  Most (including myself) worked for small companies, nonprofits, and government-run entities.

Yes, the CEO salaries are from a 2019 article. I have not been able to find any articles showing a downward skew in CEO compensation since then. 

I'm not dedicated enough to see who has what stock options. but I personally regard $5 million to $24 million annually, plus unknown stock options, to be filthy rich. You might have a different opinion. 

 

56 minutes ago, SKL said:

They exist, but they are not the majority of the youth job scene.

But young people do seem to be relatively happy and successful as short-term workers at some of those companies.

Fast food and retail are not the majority of the youth job scene? I actually have not looked this up, but I'd certainly expect that to be so. I'll try to look it up later. 

I think it's important to counter-balance the drumbeat of young people are lazy and won't work and that's why we don't have enough employees and woe to the CEOs and business owners. 

@Corralenoand @Faith-manorand others have given some good information about the reality of wages, why some business models are impractical, and why there is a labor shortage (with kids these days not being the reason). 

Certainly I do think very small businesses have a harder time of it, but the fact remains that no one is owed the right to own a successful business, and no one is owed the right to have a certain number of employees. If we're going to talk anecdotally, I know a number of very small local businesses that do a great job of attracting and retaining employees. 

A huge part of it comes down to being willing to accommodate schedules (when the heck did managers start considering that NOT part of their job??) and being willing to guarantee a certain number of hours. In the 1980s, I would have laughed my ass off if my fast food manager had told me I had to be 'on call' with no pay. They were welcome to call and see if I wanted to come in, but they certainly weren't telling me to clear my schedule just in case they needed to call me. 

There are definitely some young people who choose to not work. That doesn't automatically make them lazy.

My kids did not work in high school, because the combination of terrible pay and terrible schedules simply didn't make it worth the while (and they were willing to have no cars, limited spending money, etc.). We also knew that substantial scholarships for these particular kids were a strong possibility, and they 'earned' far more with high stats and dual enrollment at university than they would have working from 16-18. 

Yes, that is a privilege, but it is a privilege that also benefits those who do have no choice, because it pushes businesses to raise pay, be more accommodating, or both. Besides, I think most parents use the privilege they have to benefit their children. Just because you plan to have your kids work as teens doesn't mean they aren't quite privileged. 

Workers have a tiny bit more power right now, and I think that's fabulous. I hope the balance continues shifting. 

Edited November 6, 2022 by katilac

[Corraleno]

12 hours ago, katilac said:

Fast food and retail are not the majority of the youth job scene?

They are: of 1.43 million 16-19 year olds with full time jobs, 1.23 million work in food preparation and service. The situation is more diverse for summer jobs, but food service is still the largest category at 1.4 million, followed by 1.1 million in retail, 607K in "transportation and materials moving" occupations (mostly warehouse work), and 506K in office/administration jobs. (source)

Every job DD had prior to the current one was with a corporation with thousands of employees: national grocery chain with more than 250K workers, international delivery service with more than 500K employees (they hire more than 100K temp workers just for the holidays), cell phone company (2500 employees), and an international clothing chain (46,000 employees).

She current works for a small business with one owner (who also works there) and 5 employees including DD. The claim that small businesses can't afford to pay a decent wage and treat employees well is certainly not the case for this particular business, which manages to be successful while paying a good wage and treating employees like human beings whose contributions are valued and recognized as essential to the business's success. I'm not sure why that should be considered an unreasonable standard.

 

Edited November 7, 2022 by Corraleno

[KungFuPanda]

3 hours ago, Faith-manor said:

I would like to remind people who do not understand the worker shortage that 4 million people left the workforce and did not return after the 2020 lockdown. Another million retired within the next two years. A million died, and while many of those were older folks our of the workforce, we still lost a substantial amount that were working age. Women left the workforce to supervise their children for online school and when 50% of the daycares in just my state alone did not re-open, those same parents were forced to stay out of work or to reduce their hours to work only when their children were in school. The workforce was turned upside down.

On top of this, the last of the BabyBoomers are heading into retirement age, and millions more will leave creating lots of promotions for Gen X which will leave a lot of promotions for Mils. Gen Z, the current crop of teens and early to mid-20 year olds was smaller than Mils. They can't fill the vacancies left by the Mils who move up the chain. In addition to this, immigration which used to make up for labor shortfalls is exceedingly tight to non-existent. Mathematically speaking, there aren't bodies to fill the gaps. Yes, that means businesses will have to be very competitive to get workers because workers have a lot of choice, and many will not be able to hire. This is not an issue of character or morality. It is simple math.

Mils and Gen Z also have realized they are inheriting an absolute sh*tshow. Knowing how effed their futures are, they have very much collectively decided not to take the crap that Gen X has endured from their employers, and they don't have to because their presence in the workforce is desperately needed.

The reality is that a lot of businesses and companies have piss poor business plans. They really think short term, and impulsively. For instance, Dollar General has built 3 new DG's in our county. We already had a plethora of them. But the demographics of my county is that it had been losing population steadily for the last thirty years. A whomping 25% of the population is aged 60+. That is 1/4th of the population is retiring or already retired. Another 14.4% are between the ages of 18-65 and on disability. They aren't working.  The number of folks age 16-25, the ones who would often work these types of retail jobs while in high school, college, while trying to figure out what kind of career they want to end up in is only 18%. How many people are in my county. 52,400 rounded up.  Now think about how few workers that is, and they have to compete with ALL the other businesses and employers in the county from the fire places to auto parts to fast food to hospital to farms to manufacturing, which we do still have some small manufacturing places left. And the demographic of worker that DG wants are the very people graduating high school, leaving for job training and college, and never coming back. The prediction is another 8-10% lost by the next census, and the schools are looking at which districts will need to combine. The net result is not only can they not staff the new DG's, they are struggling to staff the ones they already had. So why did the ding gong company build 3 more? Because when they announce expansion, stock prices go up. Executives, board of directors, major stock holders make money. They will play this game for a while and then when DG has issues, sell high, make a killing, and then announce "Well bummer. We have to close a whole bunch of stores." It is just crazy. The amount of money they will make is ridiculous, and then the house of cards will fall. It is a business plan based on short term accumulation of wealth by abusing resources to consume land, building materials, etc. only to abandon it and leave the locals with the mess.

The county seat of only 4300 people has five auto parts stores. Five. And the newest built one, an O'Reilly, is complaining it can't make money. Well duh. It is in a three block area that includes, NAPA, Auto Value, Auto Zone, and Advanced Auto all of whom are across the road from Walmart! 🙄 No joke. What a dumb business plan! On top of which there are only 4 towns in the entire county that do not have an auto parts store.

The McDonald's/Taco Bell/Shell Gas, Dollar General in every hamlet, every city neighborhood, every suburb was NEVER a sustainable plan. Shrinking generations, and GEN Z likely to have practically zero kids in the grand scheme of "population growth" of necessity means that businesses will close. They have to close. There aren't workers for all of them. The ones that are left, like it or not, are going to have to treat their workers like liquid gold to keep them for a while until the situation equalized to where there are not a huge number of jobs available and no bodies to fill them much less workers willing to take a "go no where" job which a lot of these are. Even in my dad's heating and cooling business, there was no room for advancement, no way to get any further ahead than the worker already was. The business plan only called for 1-2% pay raises, and no expansion so no one was ever going to go anywhere in the job. That is really common with many businesses.

My county is not the only one like this. Business saturation exceeding any possibility of population support is actually not rare. 

As for young people not working, we just fetched two more face cord of wood from the two high school boys we are patrons of in the community to the north of us. They are charging $60 a face cord and have ordered 25. They have numerous customers. They make twice per hour or more for their hard work at home, and can work it round school, family life, etc. than they can make at fast food or the gas stations or anywhere else hiring high school students. We very much appreciate them and their industrious nature/hard labor, and are more than happy to spend our money with them usually leaving an additional tip after every two or three face loads we pick up. I am sure the local Dollar General manager doesn't appreciate that these hard working young men have the opportunity to control their own hours and make more money than working for DG. I have no sympathy for the company.

They charge WHAT now? What kind of wood? Literally two 4’ by 8‘ racks of firewood? That’s $400 around here for oak and more for hickory. 

[Bootsie]

6 hours ago, Faith-manor said:

I would like to remind people who do not understand the worker shortage that 4 million people left the workforce and did not return after the 2020 lockdown. Another million retired within the next two years. A million died, and while many of those were older folks our of the workforce, we still lost a substantial amount that were working age. Women left the workforce to supervise their children for online school and when 50% of the daycares in just my state alone did not re-open, those same parents were forced to stay out of work or to reduce their hours to work only when their children were in school. The workforce was turned upside down.

 

The civilian labor force in the US today is slightly larger than it was in February 2020 (164.58 million) than it was in (164.67 million).  So, while some left the workforce and didn't return, some retired, and some died, they have been replaced by new entrants to the labor force.

[Corraleno]

1 hour ago, Bootsie said:

The civilian labor force in the US today is slightly larger than it was in February 2020 (164.58 million) than it was in (164.67 million).  So, while some left the workforce and didn't return, some retired, and some died, they have been replaced by new entrants to the labor force.

 

So according to those stats the US only added 90,000 workers, in total, over the last three years — compared to the 370,000 new workers added in 2019 alone.

According to BLS.gov: "Monthly job growth has averaged 407,000 thus far in 2022, compared with 562,000 per month in 2021." That works out to roughly 11 million new jobs added in just the last two years. Although obviously some of those jobs are replacing jobs lost in 2020, there is clearly a very significant gap between the number of new jobs and the number of new workers.

This BLS report says there were 10.7 million unfilled job openings in September 2022 — compared to only 6 million in December 2019. So we have added around 4 million more jobs than workers in the last 3 years.

 

[Corraleno]

From the US Chamber of Commerce:

"We hear every day from our member companies—of every size and industry, across nearly every state—they’re facing unprecedented challenges trying to find enough workers to fill open jobs. Right now, the latest data shows that we have over 10 million job openings in the U.S.—but only around 6 million unemployed workers. We have a lot of jobs, but not enough workers to fill them. If every unemployed person in the country found a job, we would still have 4 million open jobs.

The U.S. Chamber surveyed unemployed workers who lost their jobs during the pandemic on what is keeping them from returning to work. Twenty-seven percent indicated that the need to be home and care for children or other family members has made the return to work difficult or impossible. More than a quarter (28%) indicated that they have been ill and their health has taken priority over looking for work. ... The survey also revealed some are still concerned about COVID-19 at work, indicate that pay is too low, or are more focused on acquiring new skills and education before re-entering the job market. ... [T]he pandemic drove more than 3 million adults into early retirement."

Where are the people complaining about all the "lazy" 55 year olds who retired early? Where are the people clamoring for subsidized childcare so the 27% who left the workforce due to lack of childcare can return? Where are the people demanding masking and better ventilation in the workplace to encourage cautious workers to come back, and prevent more workers from leaving the labor pool due to health complications from covid? 

Why are we only blaming one demographic (teens and 20s) for being too lazy and entitled to work, when they're such a small part of a very large and systemic problem?

Even if every unemployed worker took a job, we'd still have 4 million unfilled jobs. Businesses are either going to adapt to that or go out of business. There are lots of ways they can appeal to workers, whether that's attracting young workers or mothers who previously worked or early retirees or those who are extra cautious about covid: they can provide better pay and better working conditions, provide some kind of childcare benefit or more flexible hours, invest in better ventilation and encourage masking and let people stay home when sick without demanding doctor's notes, etc. Business owners and managers that get creative will make it work, and the ones that would rather sit around and bitch about "lazy kids these days" will likely go out of business or have to significantly scale back. 

[Heartstrings]

17 minutes ago, Corraleno said:

Business owners and managers that get creative will make it work, and the ones that would rather sit around and bitch about "lazy kids these days" will likely go out of business or have to significantly scale back. 

I saw a tik tok of a business owner who said he started hiring moms to work only school hours.  It was a move out of desperation but he said they were so focused and productive that he was able to do more business than he had before with standard hiring practices.  The creativity can pay off in multiple ways.  

[Carrie12345]

14 hours ago, SKL said:

They exist, but they are not the majority of the youth job scene.

I don’t see how that can be true in most areas. Giant Corps x many jobs is generally > Many Small Bus x few jobs.

My immediate area has a family owned gas station/mini mart, pizzeria/bar, a farm/cafe, a daycare, and two successful restaurants. There’s also a large entertainment business that operates events, so not consistent work. And we have our very own DG with a skeleton crew.  (DD applied to that DG, but was asked to work at one in the next town over.)

Most of these places have hours/conditions that require adult employees.

The “youth jobs” are more plentiful farther out, with all the fast food and big box companies. A handful of kids score cooler jobs teaching in a dojo. Few might muck stalls for barn fees. Those with licenses may offer lawn services and plowing and set their own prices. But most are going to the giant corps because those giant corps ate the mom and pop establishments.

Our pizzeria doesn’t struggle because people don’t buy enough pizza. It struggles because Dominos in the next town is cheap, and people choose cheap, fake pizza over real pizza that costs more.

And the brand new DG doesn’t look 30 years old and filthy because people don’t apply. They don’t hire enough to run a proper store AND they pay crap on top of that. (I looked into their assistant manager position, and I made more as an assistant manager for a small retail business  in 1998.)

And the Dunkin outside of town doesn’t have disgruntled employees for their hourly wage, but management just demanded bakers get hours cut so they can hire more bakers (and disqualify current ones from the bonus program.)

[Faith-manor]

13 hours ago, KungFuPanda said:

They charge WHAT now? What kind of wood? Literally two 4’ by 8‘ racks of firewood? That’s $400 around here for oak and more for hickory. 

Wood is plentiful so not expensive in our area, and lots of people have their own wood lots and portable saw mills, log splitters, etc. We have our own log splitter, just not a wood lot. So there are many many firewood sellers. It is $90 a face cord delivered, $60 if we pick it up. We have a trailer that can hold a facecord at a time so we pick it up. It is all white oak (rare to find red oak since that is always milled into lumber and sold at high price), maple, ash, birch, and occasionally a little bit of hickory. It isn't kiln dried, just stacked and seasoned naturally so this is probably last years cutting since it is all very dry.

[pinball]

28 minutes ago, Faith-manor said:

Wood is plentiful so not expensive in our area, and lots of people have their own wood lots and portable saw mills, log splitters, etc. We have our own log splitter, just not a wood lot. So there are many many firewood sellers. It is $90 a face cord delivered, $60 if we pick it up. We have a trailer that can hold a facecord at a time so we pick it up. It is all white oak (rare to find red oak since that is always milled into lumber and sold at high price), maple, ash, birch, and occasionally a little bit of hickory. It isn't kiln dried, just stacked and seasoned naturally so this is probably last years cutting since it is all very dry.

Sounds like those kids are making less than minimum wage

[Scarlett]

8 hours ago, Heartstrings said:

I saw a tik tok of a business owner who said he started hiring moms to work only school hours.  It was a move out of desperation but he said they were so focused and productive that he was able to do more business than he had before with standard hiring practices.  The creativity can pay off in multiple ways.  

Exactly.  Let people work the shifts they can work to fit their life.   
 

This summer I applied for work at home customer service work. I immediately got an email for a recorded video interview. Then immediately got an email for next round…..along with their terms.  I would have to agree to be available for shifts between 7 am to 9 pm 7 days a week. Um that would be a hard pass. 

[Faith-manor]

5 minutes ago, pinball said:

Sounds like those kids are making less than minimum wage

Doubt that. They have the machinery and can make a face cord in about 1 hour. Minimum wage here is only $10 an hour. They aren't splitting it with an axe. We also order it to spec, and can handle logs up to 24" in length in our wood boiler so they do not have to do as many cuts, and much of it is not split since we don't need it that way. We are taking three face cord split (log splitter) at $85 a face just to have small stuff for starting fires.  It is all downed wood that their dad, who got injured, is no longer milling for lumber. When we took two huge maple trees on my brother's property down with chain saws and a small tractor, we went from dropping the trees to stacked wood in one day of 9 am to 4 pm with breaks and produced 7 face cord - they were absolutely huge trees and so sad that they were diseased and had to come down. These young men are not having to fell the trees nor take the branches off. I also seriously doubt that any of the other adults managing wood lots would be willing to sell wood if they were only making minimum wage. 

[pinball]

29 minutes ago, Faith-manor said:

Doubt that. They have the machinery and can make a face cord in about 1 hour. Minimum wage here is only $10 an hour. They aren't splitting it with an axe. We also order it to spec, and can handle logs up to 24" in length in our wood boiler so they do not have to do as many cuts, and much of it is not split since we don't need it that way. We are taking three face cord split (log splitter) at $85 a face just to have small stuff for starting fires.  It is all downed wood that their dad, who got injured, is no longer milling for lumber. When we took two huge maple trees on my brother's property down with chain saws and a small tractor, we went from dropping the trees to stacked wood in one day of 9 am to 4 pm with breaks and produced 7 face cord - they were absolutely huge trees and so sad that they were diseased and had to come down. These young men are not having to fell the trees nor take the branches off. I also seriously doubt that any of the other adults managing wood lots would be willing to sell wood if they were only making minimum wage. 

LOL 😂 

sorry, Charlie…I can math…

[TechWife]

10 hours ago, Heartstrings said:

I saw a tik tok of a business owner who said he started hiring moms to work only school hours.  It was a move out of desperation but he said they were so focused and productive that he was able to do more business than he had before with standard hiring practices.  The creativity can pay off in multiple ways.  

This is one of those moments when I wish I had tik tok. I have so many questions. How old was this man? I’m betting very old with old notions about women or very young with little real life experience.  He has to be desperate to hire moms to work during school hours? That is  standard hiring practice and has been for years. Who did he previously hire? What kinds of jobs are these? He was surprised by focus & productivity? Why in the world? What employees does he have when school is out? Why aren’t they productive? Has he looked into ways he can mentor, train or otherwise encourage productivity among those who aren’t as productive? I know you don’t have the answers to this. I think if someone IRL had said this to me I might have responded “Well, duh.” 

[hshibley]

1 hour ago, Scarlett said:

Exactly.  Let people work the shifts they can work to fit their life.   
 

This summer I applied for work at home customer service work. I immediately got an email for a recorded video interview. Then immediately got an email for next round…..along with their terms.  I would have to agree to be available for shifts between 7 am to 9 pm 7 days a week. Um that would be a hard pass. 

There was a piece on NPR about this this summer. The person they were interviewing was pointing out that there was a lot employers could do to hire/keep service employees other than just raising starting wages - a stable schedule, not scheduling employees to close one night and open the next morning, intervening when customers are out of control.  
 

When I was in college I worked 2 jobs over the summer. One was only mornings and early afternoons. The other was evenings at a grocery store. Now you can’t do that. Unless you are a high schooler protected by labor laws, you need to be available for all shifts the store is open. 

[Scarlett]

Speaking of TikTok, I saw one where a woman was explaining her business model.  Small business.  I think she said she had 10 full time and maybe 5 part time.  And it was a zero profit business.  I think that was the term.  Economics is not something I really completely understand.  But anyway they all, including her, make the same money.  If it is a good year they split up the profit as bonuses....one year she looked around and realized none of them had decent cars so she bought new cars for everyone.  One year things were tight so they got together and decided to cut out the gym memberships and free lunches. I wish I could find that TikTok.  I would love to know more about it or if it is even a real thing.

[Heartstrings]

30 minutes ago, TechWife said:

This is one of those moments when I wish I had tik tok. I have so many questions. How old was this man? I’m betting very old with old notions about women or very young with little real life experience.  He has to be desperate to hire moms to work during school hours? That is  standard hiring practice and has been for years. Who did he previously hire? What kinds of jobs are these? He was surprised by focus & productivity? Why in the world? What employees does he have when school is out? Why aren’t they productive? Has he looked into ways he can mentor, train or otherwise encourage productivity among those who aren’t as productive? I know you don’t have the answers to this. I think if someone IRL had said this to me I might have responded “Well, duh.” 

I’ll see if I can find it, but who knows if so can.  The FYP is fickle. 
It involved some sort of shipping I think, where they were boxing things up.  I think he just closes after school gets out instead of trying to do an 8-5 schedule.  Why force staying open until 5 if the job is done at 2:30?  

[Corraleno]

26 minutes ago, TechWife said:

This is one of those moments when I wish I had tik tok. I have so many questions. How old was this man? I’m betting very old with old notions about women or very young with little real life experience.  He has to be desperate to hire moms to work during school hours? That is  standard hiring practice and has been for years. Who did he previously hire? What kinds of jobs are these? He was surprised by focus & productivity? Why in the world? What employees does he have when school is out? Why aren’t they productive? Has he looked into ways he can mentor, train or otherwise encourage productivity among those who aren’t as productive? I know you don’t have the answers to this. I think if someone IRL had said this to me I might have responded “Well, duh.” 

I haven't seen the TikTok, but I interpreted the post to mean that the moms got more done in, say, 6 hours than his previous employees got done in a full 8 hour day, so he was able to do more business even though the employees worked fewer hours.

 

[Scarlett]

Ok, I found her name.  Madeline_Pendelton

 

[Heartstrings]

22 minutes ago, Scarlett said:

Speaking of TikTok, I saw one where a woman was explaining her business model.  Small business.  I think she said she had 10 full time and maybe 5 part time.  And it was a zero profit business.  I think that was the term.  Economics is not something I really completely understand.  But anyway they all, including her, make the same money.  If it is a good year they split up the profit as bonuses....one year she looked around and realized none of them had decent cars so she bought new cars for everyone.  One year things were tight so they got together and decided to cut out the gym memberships and free lunches. I wish I could find that TikTok.  I would love to know more about it or if it is even a real thing.

I follow her too!   She’s great. She chooses to run her business in a unique way for sure.  She owns it, but at the end of the year instead of taking a chunk as a large salary she splits the profit equally with herself and the employees.   She talks about how they all make the same daily salary, which is about $70k per year for full time employees.  It’s just the way she feels is right versus taking a larger share for herself as the owner.  It’s innovative.  

[Corraleno]

Just now, Heartstrings said:

I’ll see if I can find it, but who knows if so can.  The FYP is fickle. 
It involved some sort of shipping I think, where they were boxing things up.  I think he just closes after school gets out instead of trying to do an 8-5 schedule.  Why force staying open until 5 if the job is done at 2:30?  

That makes perfect sense to me. DD worked for a cell phone company boxing up and shipping orders. Since she'd previously worked for UPS, which is very fast paced and much more physically demanding than filling and shipping little phone boxes, she was very efficient at it. She quickly discovered that if she packed all the orders quickly and efficiently, she'd be assigned jobs like cleaning the bathrooms and sweeping the floors, which is not what she signed up for. So she slowed down because they were literally disincentivizing fast, efficient work. That was the main reason she left that job.

It doesn't surprise me at all the manager in the TikTok video didn't realize that motivated workers with an actual incentive to get the work done as quickly and efficiently as possible would do so, instead of standing around padding their hours.

[Heartstrings]

12 minutes ago, Corraleno said:

en't seen the TikTok, but I interpreted the post to mean that the moms got more done in, say, 6 hours than his previous employees got done in a full 8 hour day, so he was able to do more business even though the employees worked fewer hours.

I think that was the desperation part, being willingly to be try a flexible schedule and get out of the 8-5 Mind set.  

[TechWife]

18 hours ago, SKL said:

All very creative interpretations of things I did not say.

The minimum wage increase was more than an extra dollar or two, at least in many places.

Employers aren't entitled to employees.  I'm just saying it's not that easy for most businesses to pull higher wages out of their asses.  The implication that most US business owners are overflowing with profit is untrue and ridiculous.

As an employer, I profit-share in addition to paying decent wages.  And when I say profit-share, that's before considering that it's my obligation, not the employees', to pay off the debt I incurred in order to make hiring businesses happen.  It's before considering that some of my tenants aren't paying their rent.  It's also before giving myself a penny of salary.  There are many businesses run by people who are not exploiters.  However, can I guarantee my employees that they will never have to work with an asshole co-worker, customer, or vendor?  No, I cannot.  Nor can I afford to pay high wages when there isn't high income to cover them.

No one implied that. The conversation is about the ultra rich who have become that way by paying people doing the work for them relatively low wages when compared to both the CEO compensation and a living wage. It is also true that we have been pointing out that money is the starting point, but not the only consideration when deciding to take a job - workplace culture is a major consideration.

Toxic workplaces, created by the employers or by the clients, should have higher pay so that the pay truly compensates for the toxicity of the culture. He CEO pay mentioned is in the context of what are commonly known to be toxic environments for the employees who are working to earn that money that is then funneled into CEO compensation in the first place. Sometimes, the income disparity in the workplace creates tension and contributes to a toxic work environment because it devalues the work of people making less money.

Employers are making choices about their company. Some of them are financial, some operational and all are  cultural. Employees are making the same choices. Is there a point, for the worker, at which they pay truly compensates them for what they are doing? By that I mean  the tasks they are doing, the expected expertise at those tasks,  and the culture in which they have to do it. That’s the sweet spot. Companies who can’t fill positions haven’t found the sweet spot. If a company can’t get to the sweet spot, change is called for, even demanded, by market conditions. 

 

[Heartstrings]

Here is the guy I was remembering.  I got a few detail wrong, but this is the video I was referring to.  
 

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTRxS1VEB/

 

All of the people in the comments are saying that flexible schedules are absolutely essential, and are hugely appreciated.  

Edited November 7, 2022 by Heartstrings

[Scarlett]

14 minutes ago, Heartstrings said:

I follow her too!   She’s great. She chooses to run her business in a unique way for sure.  She owns it, but at the end of the year instead of taking a chunk as a large salary she splits the profit equally with herself and the employees.   She talks about how they all make the same daily salary, which is about $70k per year for full time employees.  It’s just the way she feels is right versus taking a larger share for herself as the owner.  It’s innovative.  

She is great.  I have only watched a video or two of hers, but I am sort of mesmerized by the entire concept.

[Clarita]

23 hours ago, SKL said:

For most, it's not that simple to provide attractive pay and conditions and still pay the bills.  Have you done this lately?  Hired a bunch of people you don't know and kept them all happy, productive, and customer-friendly, kept the premises well-stocked and clean, and remained in the black?  If so, what are your tips for other business owners?

Here are a few things I've encountered while working that reduced toxicity and awfulness in the workplace that didn't take much money.

1. Thank you quotas. A system (since these were companies of 100+ people and global this was set up online, if smaller could just be a bulletin board or something) where people could publicly posted "Thank yous" to co-workers. Every department/employee had a quota to meet of thank yous they had to write to others (at least one/week). 
   • It did take about a year and a lot of talking pressure to be fully embraced, but once embraced it really increased moral.
   • A lot of employees have "thankless" jobs, jobs that don't get big accolades, or task oriented jobs. With those there are feelings of what I do doesn't matter, no one cares about me, and what I do is not meaningful.
2. Bosses/managers taking a stand for their subordinates when a customer, or co-worker is being inappropriate.
   • You can't make sure these things never happen but when they do there should be a culture of this isn't OK/tolerated instead of encouraged or that's the way things are. 
3. Add a pieces into company wide meetings that appreciates/showcases different divisions/sectors of your company. Anything from departments giving everyone insight into what they do day to day, to people presenting  big thing they've been working on or completed. One group/person (depending on size) gets highlighted at each meeting.

[Frances]

1 hour ago, Scarlett said:

Speaking of TikTok, I saw one where a woman was explaining her business model.  Small business.  I think she said she had 10 full time and maybe 5 part time.  And it was a zero profit business.  I think that was the term.  Economics is not something I really completely understand.  But anyway they all, including her, make the same money.  If it is a good year they split up the profit as bonuses....one year she looked around and realized none of them had decent cars so she bought new cars for everyone.  One year things were tight so they got together and decided to cut out the gym memberships and free lunches. I wish I could find that TikTok.  I would love to know more about it or if it is even a real thing.

I could see that working for some low capital businesses. But now that my son is married to someone who owns a very capital intensive small business, it’s given me a whole new perspective on the risk/reward ratio for small business owners. They both work an insane numbers of hours (for my son it’s in addition to his full time job) and everything just goes right back into the business. Every single one of their well compensated employees with good benefits and a company vehicle makes significantly more money from the business than they do combined. If they paid even their lowest paid employee what they pay themselves they would not have any employees. So someday when they hopefully make enough profit to actually get both income and profit from the business, it’s unlikely they are going to share it evenly with their employees. They are the ones making the huge sacrifices now in every way; financially, physically, mentally, stress, free time, etc.

They do have a bonus and incentive program for their employees that is already tied to profits.

Edited November 7, 2022 by Frances

[Murphy101]

I just don’t much care anymore.

Employers don’t have a right to employees. Either pay a wage and or have a working environment that people think it profitable to work for or do without. Accept your business model either needs to change or the business isn’t going to stay open. That’s capitalism.

I don’t think it is is easy for owners to pull raises out their ass or keep employees happy. Who said running a business was easy?

[Murphy101]

3 minutes ago, Frances said:

I could see that working for some low capital businesses. But now that my son is married to someone who owns a very capital intensive small business, it’s given me a whole new perspective on the risk/reward ratio for small business owners. They both work an insane numbers of hours (for my son it’s in addition to his full time job) and everything just goes right back into the business. Every single one of their well compensated employees with good benefits and a company vehicle makes significantly more money from the business than they do combined. If they paid even their lowest paid employee what they pay themselves they would not have any employees. So someday when they hopefully make enough profit to actually get both income and profit from the business, it’s unlikely they are going to share it evenly with their employees. They are the ones making the huge sacrifices now in every way; financially, physically, mentally, stress, free time, etc. They do have a bonus and incentive program for their employees that is already tied to profits.

I know business owners who were or are in this boat. That’s the average scenario for successful businesses the first 5-7 years.  Owning a business is a long investment game strategy not a quick win. In fact most don’t make it 5 years. 

As the business improves so do the profits and so do the needs for good employees.  In order to keep excellent employees and continue to recruit more - they usually have to share their rewards.  Maybe not an even split but it’s usually significant. 

I don’t care if a business owner makes a huge profit.  I care when business owners rake in millions while ignoring that their employees are struggling to make rent and pay medical bills bc they aren’t paid a living wage and then saying they are lazy snowflakes for not taking or keeping the job. 

[Heartstrings]

17 minutes ago, Frances said:

I could see that working for some low capital businesses. But now that my son is married to someone who owns a very capital intensive small business, it’s given me a whole new perspective on the risk/reward ratio for small business owners. They both work an insane numbers of hours (for my son it’s in addition to his full time job) and everything just goes right back into the business. Every single one of their well compensated employees with good benefits and a company vehicle makes significantly more money from the business than they do combined. If they paid even their lowest paid employee what they pay themselves they would not have any employees. So someday when they hopefully make enough profit to actually get both income and profit from the business, it’s unlikely they are going to share it evenly with their employees. They are the ones making the huge sacrifices now in every way; financially, physically, mentally, stress, free time, etc.

They do have a bonus and incentive program for their employees that is already tied to profits.

For this owner it makes sense.  Her business is a hair salon or beauty bar type thing, if I’m remembering correctly. She says they clear between 1-2 million most years.  For a salon owner the employees are your product.  No stylist, no money.  Her profit literally comes directly from the work of her people.  She isn’t selling widgets, she’s selling labor, essentially. She’s using a model that allows her to treat her employees well, which in turn keeps the clients happy and keeps the business profitable.  She’s been doing it this way for I think 11 years, if I’m remembering correctly.  

[Melissa Louise]

On 11/5/2022 at 12:37 PM, Corraleno said:

But that's exactly what most people in this thread are saying — people in lower-paid, "lower skill" jobs routinely get treated like crap, and it's not OK. However, the current labor shortage is finally giving workers some degree of leverage to fight against it.

 

Which is exactly what young people are currently doing, much to the dismay of business owners who are used to being able to maximize their profits by exploiting young workers.

 

I think the people in this thread who don't want their kids subjected to abusive and demeaning treatment have made it pretty clear that they oppose that kind of treatment for all workers, not just their own kids. The whole idea that people with kids who don't need to work should insist they work in toxic environments anyway, in order to make life better for those who do need to work, makes no sense in the current economic environment (or at all, IMO, but for the sake of the discussion, I'll stick to the current context).

The fact that many young people living at home aren't forced to endure toxic work environments in order to avoid starvation or eviction, and can therefore demand better pay and better working conditions, is actually improving conditions for those who do have to work. Because in the current labor market, the pool of have-to-work young adults is not nearly enough to meet demand, so employers are forced to increase pay and improve working conditions in order to also attract those who don't have to work in order to eat or have a roof over their heads. And that improves conditions for all workers — a rising tide lifts all boats.

 

Well you're certainly not going to get an argument about that on a homeschooling board. But the argument that people should send their kids to work in abusive environments, to make the environment better for those who have no choice, is strikingly reminiscent of the argument that intelligent, involved parents who care about their kids' education should put them in PS instead of homeschooling them, in order to improve public schools for the benefit of children who have no choice. And IMO the employment argument makes less sense than the education argument, because empowering kids to not put up with toxic work environments actually does improve things for the others who work there, either by forcing employers to improve conditions or providing workers with more options in an environment where jobs are plentiful and employers are desperate.

 

 

At no point did I suggest people force their children to work in abusive jobs. I think I suggested that the teens, when one typically has parental support of some kind, is a good age to learn how to do things like fight for one's work rights, including learning the skill of looking for a different  job that is less overtly toxic. And that the workplace benefits from on-the-ball teens. 

I really don't believe that m/c teens without jobs are making things better for w/c kids with jobs...we apparently have a labor shortage here, and it has not improved the workplace in any way. All that seems to happen is existing workers get squeezed to the bone. 

I am old fashioned and think that workplace organizing is the way to achieve workplace improvements ( not being snarky saying that it's old fashioned - union membership here is at an all time low...it's clearly a 20th C perspective that has been undermined and/or rejected).

Finally, I do think working 'low' jobs for a period is something that can increase empathy ( and hopefully later political action) in adults who worked as teens. Dd2 is now on a very fast track in her (professional) career, and frankly, it's a different kind of toxic, good pay for it,  but her summers in retail as a uni student, while hard, was an important experience in helping her really internalize the understanding that all labor has value. 

But yeah, basically I think the workplace is ****ed in so many ways, just most of us don't have the option to avoid it. So we have to learn to navigate it. For teens, it can be a deeply experiential learning in that navigation, while in a stage of life not typically burdened by full responsibility for a family budget (acknowledging that some teens do carry that burden). 

That's all. 

If my teens had had a binary choice between being abused (beyond the 'normal' abuse of labor for profit)  at work or not working, of course I would not expect them (nor any teen) to work in that environment. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Bootsie]

13 hours ago, Corraleno said:

 

So according to those stats the US only added 90,000 workers, in total, over the last three years — compared to the 370,000 new workers added in 2019 alone.

According to BLS.gov: "Monthly job growth has averaged 407,000 thus far in 2022, compared with 562,000 per month in 2021." That works out to roughly 11 million new jobs added in just the last two years. Although obviously some of those jobs are replacing jobs lost in 2020, there is clearly a very significant gap between the number of new jobs and the number of new workers.

This BLS report says there were 10.7 million unfilled job openings in September 2022 — compared to only 6 million in December 2019. So we have added around 4 million more jobs than workers in the last 3 years.

 

The loss of number of people working during the pandemic was roughly 7 million people.  There

are barely any more people employed today than at the beginning of the pandemic, The BLS statistics are not the sum of jobs filled and unfilled.  They are statistics of jobs that are filled.  

[Corraleno]

3 hours ago, Bootsie said:

The loss of number of people working during the pandemic was roughly 7 million people.  There

are barely any more people employed today than at the beginning of the pandemic, The BLS statistics are not the sum of jobs filled and unfilled.  They are statistics of jobs that are filled.  

But the second BLS website I linked in my post explicitly refers to unfilled job openings: "The number of job openings increased to 10.7 million on the last business day of September, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The number of hires edged down to 6.1 million, while total separations decreased to 5.7 million." So, after 6.1 million people were hired and 5.7 million people quit/retired/were fired in the month of September, there were still 10.7 million unfilled jobs as of 9/30/22. 
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.nr0.htm

The US Chamber of Commerce website that I posted upthread says the same thing: "the latest data shows that we have over 10 million job openings in the U.S.—but only around 6 million unemployed workers. We have a lot of jobs, but not enough workers to fill them. If every unemployed person in the country found a job, we would still have 4 million open jobs."
https://www.uschamber.com/workforce/understanding-americas-labor-shortage

Perhaps I misunderstood your reply to FaithManor's post about so many workers being lost to the pandemic. You replied that the current labor force is even larger than before the pandemic, because all the lost workers were replaced, so I took that to mean you were arguing that there is no actual labor shortage. But obviously if you look at the trajectory of that line from 2014-2019, we were adding around 4 million new workers per year; had it not been for the pandemic we should have added around 10-12 million workers since January 2020. Instead we've barely added any at all, but businesses have continued to expand and create new jobs, and now we've got 10.7 million unfilled jobs.

[Bootsie]

6 hours ago, Corraleno said:

But the second BLS website I linked in my post explicitly refers to unfilled job openings: "The number of job openings increased to 10.7 million on the last business day of September, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. The number of hires edged down to 6.1 million, while total separations decreased to 5.7 million." So, after 6.1 million people were hired and 5.7 million people quit/retired/were fired in the month of September, there were still 10.7 million unfilled jobs as of 9/30/22. 
https://www.bls.gov/news.release/jolts.nr0.htm

The US Chamber of Commerce website that I posted upthread says the same thing: "the latest data shows that we have over 10 million job openings in the U.S.—but only around 6 million unemployed workers. We have a lot of jobs, but not enough workers to fill them. If every unemployed person in the country found a job, we would still have 4 million open jobs."
https://www.uschamber.com/workforce/understanding-americas-labor-shortage

Perhaps I misunderstood your reply to FaithManor's post about so many workers being lost to the pandemic. You replied that the current labor force is even larger than before the pandemic, because all the lost workers were replaced, so I took that to mean you were arguing that there is no actual labor shortage. But obviously if you look at the trajectory of that line from 2014-2019, we were adding around 4 million new workers per year; had it not been for the pandemic we should have added around 10-12 million workers since January 2020. Instead we've barely added any at all, but businesses have continued to expand and create new jobs, and now we've got 10.7 million unfilled jobs.

I am not sure what to make of the labor market.  There was a tight labor market right before the pandemic hit, so to some degree we have returned to where we were a few years ago.  The number of nonfarm employees had been increasing at about 2 million per year.  That increase was expected to decline due to demographic changes before COVID hit.  The numbers can hide a lot of detail, such as whether people are working part-time or full-time.  I am not hearing of a lot of situations in which businesses are expanding and creating new jobs that did not exist before COVID hit, so the situation is a bit puzzling.   A job opening does not necessarily mean a new job has been created.  For example, there was an administrative assistant in my office; then there was a job announcement with an opening for an "assistant director of Program X"; the administrative assistant applied and was hired, and the administrative assistant job disappeared the next month.  So, while the statistics would look like a person left a job and took a newly created job (implying a job was left vacant), it was simply a transition to a new job title.  I need to dig through the numbers of the different sectors in the economy and different parts of the US to see if that explains some of the inbalance.

[katilac]

13 hours ago, TechWife said:

 He has to be desperate to hire moms to work during school hours? That is  standard hiring practice and has been for years. 

This is one of those things that I think used to be standard hiring practice, but has become less standard with the shift toward companies wanting to require constant availability. It goes hand-in-hand with not wanting to actually put in the recurring work of arranging schedules and figuring out coverage for employees who need to take off a shift, versus dumping that onto the employee (you can take off if you find someone to cover your regular shift). 

This aversion to flexibility is causing a lot of their problems, imo, but they prefer to present it as nobody wants to work these days. 

I mentioned this in another post: as per my experience, managers in the 70s & 80s were much more open to hourly employees working only school hours (moms) or two shifts per week (teens)or whatever, they didn't expect workers to find their own cover (unless it was extremely last minute for something fun), and putting in time every week to manage the schedule was just an expected part of the job. If you worked in a shipyard or machine shop, you might be hourly and on call rotation, but teens with part-time jobs were certainly not expected to be.

It may have gone past the 80s, that's where my awareness kind of ends, but I was absolutely boggled when my kids became teens and I learned that some of their friends were on unpaid call at least once a week for their minimum wage, part-time jobs. That's nuts, imo, and the various changes seemed to happen somewhere in a 20-year period (unheard of in 1990, fairly common by 2010). 

16 hours ago, Scarlett said:

I would have to agree to be available for shifts between 7 am to 9 pm 7 days a week. Um that would be a hard pass. 

Right, they don't even want people to have a regular shift! Just rearrange your life every week or two with very little notice. The stupidest part is that having regular shifts would make scheduling easier, not harder. It's like some weird power play that doesn't even benefit them. 

[pinball]

19 hours ago, hshibley said:

There was a piece on NPR about this this summer. The person they were interviewing was pointing out that there was a lot employers could do to hire/keep service employees other than just raising starting wages - a stable schedule, not scheduling employees to close one night and open the next morning, intervening when customers are out of control.  
 

When I was in college I worked 2 jobs over the summer. One was only mornings and early afternoons. The other was evenings at a grocery store. Now you can’t do that. Unless you are a high schooler protected by labor laws, you need to be available for all shifts the store is open. 

You’re last paragraph is not my experience with many, many entry level locations. Employees are asked their availability and preferences and for the most part, those are honored. 
 

Sometimes, exceptions need to be made but they are just that…exceptions. Ie: “I know you usually aren’t available after 9 pm but can you help out on Thursday?”

[Carrie12345]

3 minutes ago, pinball said:

You’re last paragraph is not my experience with many, many entry level locations. Employees are asked their availability and preferences and for the most part, those are honored. 
 

Sometimes, exceptions need to be made but they are just that…exceptions. Ie: “I know you usually aren’t available after 9 pm but can you help out on Thursday?”

I see that to a degree. My dd doesn’t work Tuesdays or Saturdays unless she’s agreed to cover for someone. So that’s 2 days off like the average work week. But she has no control over when they put her on the other 5 days. She ends up with a lot of opening after closing.

Still better than DG, where her schedule would get changed even after it posted. But not enough to facilitate run of the mill things like scheduling doctors appointments or making social plans more than a few days out.

[pinball]

6 minutes ago, Carrie12345 said:

I see that to a degree. My dd doesn’t work Tuesdays or Saturdays unless she’s agreed to cover for someone. So that’s 2 days off like the average work week. But she has no control over when they put her on the other 5 days. She ends up with a lot of opening after closing.

Still better than DG, where her schedule would get changed even after it posted. But not enough to facilitate run of the mill things like scheduling doctors appointments or making social plans more than a few days out.

How many times has she asked not to be scheduled for opening after closing (clopening)? Sometimes schedule makers have positive responses to employees pointing that out.

[Murphy101]

7 hours ago, katilac said:

This aversion to flexibility is causing a lot of their problems, imo, but they prefer to present it as nobody wants to work these days.

Yep. And hey if they’d rather go out of business bc they can’t find staff to suit their flawed methods instead of adapat to survive? 🤷‍♀️

7 hours ago, katilac said:

Right, they don't even want people to have a regular shift! Just rearrange your life every week or two with very little notice. The stupidest part is that having regular shifts would make scheduling easier, not harder. It's like some weird power play that doesn't even benefit them. 

Dh and I have mentioned this. Back in the late 80s and early 90s, you walked in filled out an application shook hands and got the job.  Places needs employees and as long as you showed up and actually worked - you were a shoe-in.  They had policies in writing but the truth was that if you showed up and worked - they’d pretty much do anything to make your life work friendly. Schedule changes, small bit incremental regular pay raises, catch the flu and didn’t have sick time but at least you knew you wouldn’t lose your job bc frankly, they needed you and even if you did - you could apply elsewhere and get it pretty quick.

My kids have left jobs over schedules. The employer says that employees must be flexible. No. They don’t.  They say what days and times they can work and it’s up to the employer to work with that.  Especially since so much of it is part time no benefits work. My daughter works 3 pt time jobs and is in college full time. Many of these places want “flexibility” from someone getting less than 20 hours a week. That’s not workable. In order for her to sustain herself, she has to have 3 pt jobs to get a full 35-42 hour a week of pay. She can’t work those jobs and go to school without a fixed schedule for all of it. 

It’s one reason chick fil a is a great employer. They know they need to “over hire” so that they have enough employees to schedule. And that’s what they do. The scheduler works very hard to arrange everyone’s schedule and none of the employees are given attitude for making schedule change requests.  They just beg employees to please give a week or so notice so shifts can be covered.

[Murphy101]

1 hour ago, pinball said:

How many times has she asked not to be scheduled for opening after closing (clopening)? Sometimes schedule makers have positive responses to employees pointing that out.

In the experience of my family - schedule makers are rarely positive.  They know this is an issue.  They do it anyways. Usually bc there’s no one else to fill the schedule bc they need to hire more people but no one wants to work there bc of stuff like this. Especially for open/close bc those positions usually only go to people who have been there a bit and deemed trustworthy. Which they probably are but that doesn’t mean they want to live a zombie life due to horrible shifts. 

[Scarlett]

I know ds21 hired on at Lowes and told them he would not work Wednesday night or Sunday morning.  They agreed,  but several times he would see they had scheduled him and he would have to track someone down and remind them that is a shift he would not do.  After 6 months or so he took a position there that is Monday-Friday 5:30 am to 2:30 p.m so it was no longer a problem. He has a new job now starting next week with similar Mon-Friday jobs.  
 

At Lowes before he got the Monday through Friday job he was scheduled many times to work until 11 p.m and then have to go in the next morning at 6:00 a.m. 

 

[hshibley]

5 minutes ago, Scarlett said:

 

At Lowes before he got the Monday through Friday job he was scheduled many times to work until 11 p.m and then have to go in the next morning at 6:00 a.m. 

 

This was my kids experience working at McDonald’s after they turn 18. Many closing shifts getting out sometime between 11 and 12 then opening shifts the following morning between 5 and 6.
 

My dh and I were on a trip last year. We were heading back to our hotel room after breakfast sharing the elevator with a young man who worked in the hotel restaurant. Chatting he mentioned how he had closed the restaurant the night before and was opening the restaurant that  morning. 
 

This experience seems ubiquitous with service workers now. 

[historically accurate]

6 hours ago, Scarlett said:

I know ds21 hired on at Lowes and told them he would not work Wednesday night or Sunday morning.  They agreed,  but several times he would see they had scheduled him and he would have to track someone down and remind them that is a shift he would not do.  After 6 months or so he took a position there that is Monday-Friday 5:30 am to 2:30 p.m so it was no longer a problem. He has a new job now starting next week with similar Mon-Friday jobs.  
 

At Lowes before he got the Monday through Friday job he was scheduled many times to work until 11 p.m and then have to go in the next morning at 6:00 a.m. 

 

When I worked for a couple of years at Lowe's back in the mid-90s, it was actually the managers who had to do the close to open back to back if we were short staffed. I did the scheduling for the front line for the last few months I was there, and I was to only schedule managers that way if absolutely needed so it wasn't on the cashiers/floor workers. 

Edited November 8, 2022 by historically accurate

[Heartstrings]

8 hours ago, katilac said:

Right, they don't even want people to have a regular shift! Just rearrange your life every week or two with very little notice. The stupidest part is that having regular shifts would make scheduling easier, not harder. It's like some weird power play that doesn't even benefit them. 

Or incompetence. 

2 hours ago, pinball said:

ou’re last paragraph is not my experience with many, many entry level locations. Employees are asked their availability and preferences and for the most part, those are honored.

My experience has been that the applicant gives a preference, the hiring managers assures them it will honored and then it is promptly ignored until the employee quits.

I've worked a couple of part time jobs while homeschooling.  One I was scheduled 7-11.  Got sent home at 9 most day, then called in at 1 to work the 2-6 shift.  EVERYDAY.  Huge guilt trips if I couldn't or wouldn't do it.  When I left at 9 every morning, I'd ask if they had the afternoon covered and they'd just say that they had to look it.  They were literally doing scheduling for the afternoon at lunch time and just calling people.

I worked at  a grocery store that gave me a set shift, no problem.  It was great. Except getting called two or three times a week to cover a day shift, during hours that I had no child care and needed to be home for school, so I couldn't work.  Again, huge quilt trips if I said no.

My son was hired at chick fil a.  Asked for full time, only got part time, including the lower pay rate that part time employees get.  They proceeded to work him 40 hours a week for 2 months.  He was blown off when he asked for the full time pay rate since he was working full time.  He quit soon after.

Edited November 8, 2022 by Heartstrings