'stupid analysis' = regurgitating corporate talking points about why low skilled workers don't deserve dignified lives and families, like they did back when america was great.
if you work for a living, bootlicking and oligarch being the words of 2024 should give you pause for reflection
it's hard to overcome a lifetime of propaganda though
Except nobody ever said low skilled workers don’t deserve respect or an opportunity to make a living. Collective bargaining is necessary in some industries. But schlepping coffee as a 24-year old is not even remotely the same thing as engineering and manufacturing cars or airplanes, digging coal out of mines, going up on construction cranes, even teaching, etc. It’s more akin to bartending and bartenders make a boatload of money at a much lower wage than a typical Starbucks barista. Now, how is that? How should YOU be treating your barista?
By the way, if you want to get back to the great 1950s that you are essentially promoting (you know after WW2 when we rebuilt basically the entire world and a manufacturing dynasty), then you should love Trump and his economic nationalism and populism. You should want to completely undo the globally integrated economy and bring all manufacturing back to America. All of it. Only American chip fabs. Only American produced pharmaceuticals, no generics. Only American cars with all parts produced in America.
Moreover, if you really wanted the small mom & pop service oriented companies, like locally owned coffee shops, then you would’ve voted for the completely opposite policies we enacted during COVID where we destroyed 50% of small business but further buttressed the Targets, Amazons, and Starbucks of the country.
Here is the actual Starbucks income statement for those of us who don’t live in the fairy tale.
In Newname’s pollyannish fictional version of the world (where he also ignores tips) he would redistribute 200% of net income to SG&A (a little to COGS but mostly SG&A). Nevermind that it doesn’t exist. Nevermind that if you significantly whack the shareholders, they will stop infusing capital into your company, they will do the opposite. Instead of growing and investing more into the product, Starbucks will be forced to actually stop operating some locations.
But, let’s get realistic and only redistribute 25% of it (it will still crimp operations, but for imagination’s sake, let’s do it). You might achieve a $2 per hour raise. Cool. We can also take all of the big, bad, evil Howard Schulz’s ownership, after tax of course after we confiscate all of his equity and sell it and get these 24-year old newbies working 30 hours per week another maybe $3 per hour. Maybe. But only for the year. After 2025, there’s no more Schulz money to distribute.
It’s really fun to just have graduated college and wax poetic about concepts you just learned like supply and demand curves, oligarchs and bootlickers, etc with absolutely zero concept of reality and no practical experience starting or running a business. Which describes you. Sorry if that offends you in some way and you just can’t help resisting the urge to keep “maligning the man” instead of simply admitting that you are just absolutely clueless.
Happy Hanukkah everyone. I’m going to go go get a coffee at the locally owned small coffee shop and float the baristas a $100. Anywhere but Starbucks.
You're making two different arguments here. One is simply about whether serving coffee is an important enough thing to be allowed to demand a living wage to do, and the other is that the US can't have wages the equivalent of the post-War period up to 1980 without complete autarky.
The first argument is just dumb. Service sector employment, including retail and hospitality, is a massive and growing segment of all employment in the US (which makes sense in a post-industrial economy like the US) and the firms the dominate these sectors are just as profitable as the ones that drove growth and provided living wages 60-70 years ago. But you're saying that the leading companies in these sectors, ones like Starbucks, simply can't afford to cough up even a buck or two more per hour to the people who actually provide the service? If they can't maybe they should fail and concede market share to companies that can and will. This, in fact, has been this historic function of minimum wage laws and strong unions: to force out companies that can only succeed by super-exploiting working people and turn their market share over to more efficient companies. E.g. The restriction of the working day to 10 hours, and then eventually to 8 hours. Can't make a profit with an 8 hour working day? Out you go!
The second argument is even dumber. During the "glorious 30" post-war years the US was at the center of a burgeoning global division of labor, the furthest thing from "america first" autarky. The massive skewing of income and wealth since the 1980s was NOT the product of internationalization. It was the result of a set of policy choices ostensibly aimed at increasing investment and growth that simply had the effect of creating massive inequalities of wealth and income in which the benefits of any new growth were distributed upward. Some of the most open (i.e. internationalized) economies in the world are also ones with the highest wages and most generous social provision. It is simply facile to suggest that the US capital is today so stretched that it can't begin to produce a standard of living approaching what it did 60 years ago without removing itself from the international division of labor.
You may understand "business", but you appear completely ignorant of the economic history of your own country and of the system out of which it actually grew: industrial capitalism via colonialism.
If baristas want to make more they can negotiate with their employers or find different employment. I don’t think there’s a monopsony in the labor market here. Not sure what all the fuss is about.
'stupid analysis' = regurgitating corporate talking points about why low skilled workers don't deserve dignified lives and families, like they did back when america was great.
if you work for a living, bootlicking and oligarch being the words of 2024 should give you pause for reflection
it's hard to overcome a lifetime of propaganda though
Except nobody ever said low skilled workers don’t deserve respect or an opportunity to make a living. Collective bargaining is necessary in some industries. But schlepping coffee as a 24-year old is not even remotely the same thing as engineering and manufacturing cars or airplanes, digging coal out of mines, going up on construction cranes, even teaching, etc. It’s more akin to bartending and bartenders make a boatload of money at a much lower wage than a typical Starbucks barista. Now, how is that? How should YOU be treating your barista?
By the way, if you want to get back to the great 1950s that you are essentially promoting (you know after WW2 when we rebuilt basically the entire world and a manufacturing dynasty), then you should love Trump and his economic nationalism and populism. You should want to completely undo the globally integrated economy and bring all manufacturing back to America. All of it. Only American chip fabs. Only American produced pharmaceuticals, no generics. Only American cars with all parts produced in America.
Moreover, if you really wanted the small mom & pop service oriented companies, like locally owned coffee shops, then you would’ve voted for the completely opposite policies we enacted during COVID where we destroyed 50% of small business but further buttressed the Targets, Amazons, and Starbucks of the country.
Here is the actual Starbucks income statement for those of us who don’t live in the fairy tale.
In Newname’s pollyannish fictional version of the world (where he also ignores tips) he would redistribute 200% of net income to SG&A (a little to COGS but mostly SG&A). Nevermind that it doesn’t exist. Nevermind that if you significantly whack the shareholders, they will stop infusing capital into your company, they will do the opposite. Instead of growing and investing more into the product, Starbucks will be forced to actually stop operating some locations.
But, let’s get realistic and only redistribute 25% of it (it will still crimp operations, but for imagination’s sake, let’s do it). You might achieve a $2 per hour raise. Cool. We can also take all of the big, bad, evil Howard Schulz’s ownership, after tax of course after we confiscate all of his equity and sell it and get these 24-year old newbies working 30 hours per week another maybe $3 per hour. Maybe. But only for the year. After 2025, there’s no more Schulz money to distribute.
It’s really fun to just have graduated college and wax poetic about concepts you just learned like supply and demand curves, oligarchs and bootlickers, etc with absolutely zero concept of reality and no practical experience starting or running a business. Which describes you. Sorry if that offends you in some way and you just can’t help resisting the urge to keep “maligning the man” instead of simply admitting that you are just absolutely clueless.
Happy Hanukkah everyone. I’m going to go go get a coffee at the locally owned small coffee shop and float the baristas a $100. Anywhere but Starbucks.
I really, really hope you're a multi-millionaire and can live comfortably of your assets. At least then you'd be arguing in your personal interest, in a very limited sense.
If you're not, you're just a sucker making other people's argument for them and helping them destroy your country's quality of life to boot.
You say I've 'just graduated college' which is kind of true - I just finished another postgrad degree as valedictorian. But my first masters in engineering was 15 years ago.
Side question, if someone works a full-time job, should they still be "poor" or should people who work full-time be able to make a living wage?
If not, then why would anyone take these jobs? I understand (and agree) with you that they are easy jobs in terms of the educational level needed to do them, but it seems like it is possible to work full time and still be poor. That feels weird to me.
Are we okay with that? Work 40 hours a week, do a good job at work each day, and still be poor?
you said it. who's gonna go to school if you can just get a job at 16 that will pay you to have a nice living.
And honestly, most people make 15 an hour or more these days. Many fast food type places are closer to 20. You can live off that. Problem is everybody wants what everybody else has.
How brainwashed are you? All “everyone” wants is not to worry about food shelter and medicine. Homes not projects apartments should be affordable to any full time worker
The problem with the solutions presented here is the stock market demands quarter over quarter growth. No matter how much money you make you have to make more than next quarter. No matter how many billions in profit they have they can't give it back to the workers because that is not how the market works. It's unfortunate and I don't like it but a publicly traded company must do anything it can to increase quarter over quarter and is not allowed to think about the long term.
If baristas want to make more they can negotiate with their employers or find different employment. I don’t think there’s a monopsony in the labor market here. Not sure what all the fuss is about.
You’re not wrong, at all. They can negotiate OR find different employment, if they can and that’s the key point.
The problem is people here think a 22-year old with no education, no skills, and no professional appearance deserves to be making $40 per hour (plus 401k plus health plus dental plus money for school of course) for literally learning how to make an assortment of coffees inside 24-48 hours time, and anything less is just pure evil and oligarchy.
It’s like the guy who asked earlier (who I’m assuming is an engineer), why would I invest in four plus years of school to make $80,000 per year when I could’ve saved myself the headache and money and time and just gone to work at Starbucks?
Furthermore, you get morons on here who come up with make believe numbers like, “hey, we can just take 50% of gross revenue and hand it to the workers and chop up the rest for everyone else.” Neato. Monopoly money.
Here’s an idea. How about we let the Starbucks baristas keep the 25% of their paychecks they cough up in taxes, since we are playing this fun imaginary game? Also, all of you Starbucks addicts can tip 25% on your $8 order rather than the no tip or $0.50 tip you are currently giving. Why aren’t you already least giving a $3 tip? Why aren’t you already doing that? That will solve the entire problem.
But you’re right Harambe. Starbucks employees are free to ask to double their salaries, Starbucks is free to raise prices, and I’m free to never, ever go there again. And I won’t. That’s how the market works. And if locations get shut down and people lose jobs, so be it.
Super brilliant time to strike too. When profit margins are completely squeezed and management’s hands are tied. Incredibly high IQ Union reps there. Gee, I wonder if Starbucks will be forced to raise their prices…
If baristas want to make more they can negotiate with their employers or find different employment. I don’t think there’s a monopsony in the labor market here. Not sure what all the fuss is about.
You’re not wrong, at all. They can negotiate OR find different employment, if they can and that’s the key point.
The problem is people here think a 22-year old with no education, no skills, and no professional appearance deserves to be making $40 per hour (plus 401k plus health plus dental plus money for school of course) for literally learning how to make an assortment of coffees inside 24-48 hours time, and anything less is just pure evil and oligarchy.
It’s like the guy who asked earlier (who I’m assuming is an engineer), why would I invest in four plus years of school to make $80,000 per year when I could’ve saved myself the headache and money and time and just gone to work at Starbucks?
Furthermore, you get morons on here who come up with make believe numbers like, “hey, we can just take 50% of gross revenue and hand it to the workers and chop up the rest for everyone else.” Neato. Monopoly money.
Here’s an idea. How about we let the Starbucks baristas keep the 25% of their paychecks they cough up in taxes, since we are playing this fun imaginary game? Also, all of you Starbucks addicts can tip 25% on your $8 order rather than the no tip or $0.50 tip you are currently giving. Why aren’t you already least giving a $3 tip? Why aren’t you already doing that? That will solve the entire problem.
But you’re right Harambe. Starbucks employees are free to ask to double their salaries, Starbucks is free to raise prices, and I’m free to never, ever go there again. And I won’t. That’s how the market works. And if locations get shut down and people lose jobs, so be it.
Nobody deserves anything. The market is amoral. If the strikers win and Starbucks can’t absorb the higher salaries they will have to raise prices. That may lead them to lose customers.
All of this can be resolved without any culture war BS around deserves. The market is the ultimate decider. We can simply live our lives.
Nobody deserves anything. The market is amoral. If the strikers win and Starbucks can’t absorb the higher salaries they will have to raise prices. That may lead them to lose customers.
All of this can be resolved without any culture war BS around deserves. The market is the ultimate decider. We can simply live our lives.
The problem is that some people/corporations know how to manipulate the market so the tax-payers (via the government) have to pay to support the employees who are working in low-wage jobs to generate huge profits for the ultra-wealthy and corporations.
They get to keep all the profit but we (normal people) have to pay taxes to support their poor workers because they don't earn a living wage.
The corporations/employers claim they can't pay a living wage or they would go out of business. They threaten us with price hikes but we are already paying "extra" because our taxes get blown on social programs that should not needed in the first place if the marketplace actually worked as intended.
The middle class pays to support the poor so the top 1% can skim billions and billions off the top of the "free market" and hoard it.
Nobody deserves anything. The market is amoral. If the strikers win and Starbucks can’t absorb the higher salaries they will have to raise prices. That may lead them to lose customers.
All of this can be resolved without any culture war BS around deserves. The market is the ultimate decider. We can simply live our lives.
The problem is that some people/corporations know how to manipulate the market so the tax-payers (via the government) have to pay to support the employees who are working in low-wage jobs to generate huge profits for the ultra-wealthy and corporations.
They get to keep all the profit but we (normal people) have to pay taxes to support their poor workers because they don't earn a living wage.
The corporations/employers claim they can't pay a living wage or they would go out of business. They threaten us with price hikes but we are already paying "extra" because our taxes get blown on social programs that should not needed in the first place if the marketplace actually worked as intended.
The middle class pays to support the poor so the top 1% can skim billions and billions off the top of the "free market" and hoard it.
They also buy up propaganda outlets to get suckers to make their arguments for them - we've seen a lot in this thread
Except nobody ever said low skilled workers don’t deserve respect or an opportunity to make a living. Collective bargaining is necessary in some industries. But schlepping coffee as a 24-year old is not even remotely the same thing as engineering and manufacturing cars or airplanes, digging coal out of mines, going up on construction cranes, even teaching, etc. It’s more akin to bartending and bartenders make a boatload of money at a much lower wage than a typical Starbucks barista. Now, how is that? How should YOU be treating your barista?
By the way, if you want to get back to the great 1950s that you are essentially promoting (you know after WW2 when we rebuilt basically the entire world and a manufacturing dynasty), then you should love Trump and his economic nationalism and populism. You should want to completely undo the globally integrated economy and bring all manufacturing back to America. All of it. Only American chip fabs. Only American produced pharmaceuticals, no generics. Only American cars with all parts produced in America.
Moreover, if you really wanted the small mom & pop service oriented companies, like locally owned coffee shops, then you would’ve voted for the completely opposite policies we enacted during COVID where we destroyed 50% of small business but further buttressed the Targets, Amazons, and Starbucks of the country.
Here is the actual Starbucks income statement for those of us who don’t live in the fairy tale.
In Newname’s pollyannish fictional version of the world (where he also ignores tips) he would redistribute 200% of net income to SG&A (a little to COGS but mostly SG&A). Nevermind that it doesn’t exist. Nevermind that if you significantly whack the shareholders, they will stop infusing capital into your company, they will do the opposite. Instead of growing and investing more into the product, Starbucks will be forced to actually stop operating some locations.
But, let’s get realistic and only redistribute 25% of it (it will still crimp operations, but for imagination’s sake, let’s do it). You might achieve a $2 per hour raise. Cool. We can also take all of the big, bad, evil Howard Schulz’s ownership, after tax of course after we confiscate all of his equity and sell it and get these 24-year old newbies working 30 hours per week another maybe $3 per hour. Maybe. But only for the year. After 2025, there’s no more Schulz money to distribute.
It’s really fun to just have graduated college and wax poetic about concepts you just learned like supply and demand curves, oligarchs and bootlickers, etc with absolutely zero concept of reality and no practical experience starting or running a business. Which describes you. Sorry if that offends you in some way and you just can’t help resisting the urge to keep “maligning the man” instead of simply admitting that you are just absolutely clueless.
Happy Hanukkah everyone. I’m going to go go get a coffee at the locally owned small coffee shop and float the baristas a $100. Anywhere but Starbucks.
I really, really hope you're a multi-millionaire and can live comfortably of your assets. At least then you'd be arguing in your personal interest, in a very limited sense.
If you're not, you're just a sucker making other people's argument for them and helping them destroy your country's quality of life to boot.
You say I've 'just graduated college' which is kind of true - I just finished another postgrad degree as valedictorian. But my first masters in engineering was 15 years ago.
Side question, if someone works a full-time job, should they still be "poor" or should people who work full-time be able to make a living wage?
If not, then why would anyone take these jobs? I understand (and agree) with you that they are easy jobs in terms of the educational level needed to do them, but it seems like it is possible to work full time and still be poor. That feels weird to me.
Are we okay with that? Work 40 hours a week, do a good job at work each day, and still be poor?
Correct. I was running with a friend today and she said, "We should fine the Walmart's and Amazon's of the world if they make $$ by having their employees on welfare or having the govt pick up their health care."
A delivery driver for amazon makes hardly anything. A delivery driver for UPS makes a nice living.
At the same time, I understand why a $30 minimum wage would wipe out fast food in this country. I mean let's say a ChicFila location makes 500k. They employ sommething like 60-70 people I read. If it's 60, it's still less than $5 profit per hour per employee.
Side question, if someone works a full-time job, should they still be "poor" or should people who work full-time be able to make a living wage?
If not, then why would anyone take these jobs? I understand (and agree) with you that they are easy jobs in terms of the educational level needed to do them, but it seems like it is possible to work full time and still be poor. That feels weird to me.
Are we okay with that? Work 40 hours a week, do a good job at work each day, and still be poor?
Correct. I was running with a friend today and she said, "We should fine the Walmart's and Amazon's of the world if they make $ by having their employees on welfare or having the govt pick up their health care."
A delivery driver for amazon makes hardly anything. A delivery driver for UPS makes a nice living.
At the same time, I understand why a $30 minimum wage would wipe out fast food in this country. I mean let's say a ChicFila location makes 500k. They employ sommething like 60-70 people I read. If it's 60, it's still less than $5 profit per hour per employee.
Why? This is just supply and demand. If there were better jobs that paid more these people would take them. They’re not dumb and choosing to work for Amazon when they could work for UPS.
Your proposal is just an increase to the minimum wage.
Amazon has a very generous healthcare policy, no? I don’t think they’re really the problem here. Unless the delivery employees are contractors in which case what you really want is a very progressive overhaul of employment regulations. CA has tried to do this - it’s a very liberal policy position.
you said it. who's gonna go to school if you can just get a job at 16 that will pay you to have a nice living.
And honestly, most people make 15 an hour or more these days. Many fast food type places are closer to 20. You can live off that. Problem is everybody wants what everybody else has.
How brainwashed are you? All “everyone” wants is not to worry about food shelter and medicine. Homes not projects apartments should be affordable to any full time worker
BS. people want everything. the newest phones. ordering out from grub hub, etc. nobody wants just a place to live and groceries. give them and every fast food worker what they want. fine. all of our wages will sky rocket as well. Inflation will be even worse than it has been the past 4 years, as hard as that is to imagine.
people are talking as if they are working for $8 per hour. it's actually double that.
WO grubhub, uber eats, doordash there is no Flotrack, Runnerspace, Mt Sac Relays, Track Town USA, and so on. They all work gig jobs. There's no pay at those meets. Even the CEOs dont get paid a dime.
Side question, if someone works a full-time job, should they still be "poor" or should people who work full-time be able to make a living wage?
If not, then why would anyone take these jobs? I understand (and agree) with you that they are easy jobs in terms of the educational level needed to do them, but it seems like it is possible to work full time and still be poor. That feels weird to me.
Are we okay with that? Work 40 hours a week, do a good job at work each day, and still be poor?
Correct. I was running with a friend today and she said, "We should fine the Walmart's and Amazon's of the world if they make $ by having their employees on welfare or having the govt pick up their health care."
A delivery driver for amazon makes hardly anything. A delivery driver for UPS makes a nice living.
At the same time, I understand why a $30 minimum wage would wipe out fast food in this country. I mean let's say a ChicFila location makes 500k. They employ sommething like 60-70 people I read. If it's 60, it's still less than $5 profit per hour per employee.
Yes. And the problem is that if UPS and Amazon both need 50,000 workers (for example) and only UPS pays a living wage, it does not make sense to just tell the Amazon workers to "switch to UPS." Obviously that is not possible.
I knew a guy who used to say, if you don't like stocking the shelves, you should become the store manager. But telling people to just "be a manager" doesn't make sense because you can't all be managers. Some people have to just work in the store or be regular employees.
The question is, should people who are not "manager material" also have clean drinking water, access to education, and police protection? Yes? What about safe, affordable housing? What about health care?
Where do we draw the line on what a person who works an honest 40 hours a week (but isn't a great candidate for a higher position) deserve to have? After all, without these people we would not have a functioning economy or society.
A couple people on this thread have wondered whether baristas want money just to buy groceries and pay rent, or whether there are levels of luxury living going on.
I watch people pretty closely, and here’s the most comprehensive answer I can come up with:
People working low-end jobs sometimes pay for things that I think are wasteful or unnecessary. I can think of cashiers at the Walmart who get their nails professionally done, but there are so many other examples. Bussers or food runners with the latest iPhone.
The thing is, someone who is inexperienced with money starts out thinking that every penny they make is disposable income. If you’ve never needed a root canal before, maybe you aren’t accounting for dental emergencies. If you are driving a car your parents gave you, maybe you don’t have any concept of how much it’s going to cost when you need new tires, need to have your brakes worked on, or need to get a belt replaced.
It’s pretty hard to budget for the unknown, but if you’re smart you know that there WILL be an unknown. True for baristas as well as the rest of us! So you need to constantly be setting money aside for the unknown, and if you hope to cover the unplanned expenses without taking on debt.
Personally, I couldn’t manage this on a $20 an hour job, and this is true even though I am naturally the kind of person who is willing to live very cheaply. You really just can’t stretch the money that far. (People sometimes work a second job, which can sometimes help them play catchup, or satisfy their needs to have disposable income, but I’m not sure how many people can maintain good health while constantly running sleep deficits.)
I obviously side with the baristas — if you want people to be reliable and bring a good work ethic and give good customer service, you gotta give them an hourly that has a chance of being workable. It is really tough to do these kinds of jobs well if you don’t have your basic needs taken care of.
