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This topic comprises 9 pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
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Author
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Topic: "The Living Wage" (coming soon to a Theatre Near You)
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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."
Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted 01-30-2018 01:06 PM
quote: Jack Ondracek
OK, but if you overpay for the time, people who crutch on these entry-level jobs aren't likely to be motivated toward anything better. An entry-level job doesn't have to be reserved for a teen-ager. Experience level and the value of one's work isn't necessarily tied to age.
Low wage jobs (such as those in fast food restaurants) have a high employee turnover rate. No one is looking to make a career out of being a McDonald's fry cook. People in low income groups aren't "cruching" on these jobs as much as they are often stuck working those kinds of jobs due to their own individual circumstances. Saying they won't likely be motivated to do anything better assumes all have both plenty of money and spare time for higher education or vocational training as well as access to better job opportunities.
Nevertheless all of these businesses using minimum wage staff, open weekdays while school is in session or late at night, still need adult bodies to staff those positions. That's regardless if it's the same bodies showing up to work months or years later. Those employees have to survive somehow while working there. More often than not that's going to mean working multiple jobs or doing other odd work to earn money. I know single mothers who have to work day jobs and then wait tables or tend bar at night. They're not getting enough (or any) child support from the baby-daddies and the fact they're working screws them out of assistance for things like child health care from the government.
quote: Dave Bird
Saddling yourself with a mortgage not knowing the mine or the plant will close long before you pay it off is pretty common. Thinking you "deserve" stuff you see other people have (when most of it's probably bought with debt) sure bites a lot of people.
Many Americans are guilty of playing the Keeping up the Joneses game. I've seen a lot of that with upper-middle and upper class income people -or rather people trying to project the appearance of being a member of the upper income brackets. They finance big houses, expensive vehicles, vacation trips and all sorts of other stuff they can't really afford. And then they have the audacity to upgrade into even more lavish digs.
That was a big part of what fueled that housing industry fiasco last decade. I still remember that Countrywide Mortgage TV commercial where this couple was arguing in their kitchen over buying a home. The husband had all kinds of doubts but the wife chewed on him like he was some kind of idiot, eventually making him cave with the "we can do this" line. I wish I could find a copy of that video.
quote: Mike Blakesley
It's not like opportunities don't exist. In my own hometown, just to give one example, there is a great need for a plumber. We have one plumber in town but he's approaching retirement age. He is busier than two rabbits in heat. Some kid -- or two -- could graduate high school, go to a trade school to learn plumbing, come back here and make a handsome living.
Lots of people don't want to settle for something like that. They still have the fantasy in their heads they're going to hit it rich in some white collar career someday. So going to college and racking up a shit-ton of student loan debt is the first step.
Blue collar trades (like being a plumber, mechanic, electrician, carpenter, etc) are not "clean" jobs. Plumbing work is one of the most unpleasant out of all trades. I sure wouldn't want to be under a house in the dead of winter fixing a busted pipe while laying in a bunch of freezing water, mud and Lord knows what else.
quote: Leo Enticknap
What makes that all the more inexplicable is that the quality of life in smaller, more rural communities is (assuming you're making enough to live reasonably) an order of magnitude better. I would give up the 20-30 hours a week behind the wheel of the car, air quality so bad that HVAC filters which are supposed to last 90 days are clogged up after a month, housing and taxation costs rising out of control, an increasing crime rate, etc. etc. in a heartbeat, if our family circumstances allowed it.
The cost of living is lower, but that varies from one town to the next. I think apartment rental prices here in Lawton are crazy for the size of this city (it's just as high as Oklahoma City), but movement of military troops through here is one thing that helps keep rental prices high.
Small towns and even small cities (like here in Lawton) have a difficult time retaining their young people. Kids grow up, get out of high school, go to college (or trade school) and often leave town for good. Some rural towns may offer some good job opportunities, but what do they offer socially? Finding a significant other or spouse might be even more of a reason for a young person to leave a small town. When the small, rural town is left mostly with an aging and elderly population its tax base shrinks. Things we take for granted, like police and fire dept service, become difficult to afford luxuries. Infrastructure prices are just about as high in small towns as they are in big cities. The shrinking tax base can't keep up with the expense. A rural town in bad enough shape could be forced to close the local school. Once that happens the town is all but dead.
quote: Dave Bird
But most of all, I like the line that I think Lou Holtz used. "Don't talk about your problems. 80% of the people don't care and the other 20% are glad you have 'em."
And that saying probably needs to be put on our nation's flag. It would be a more accurate representation of our culture of selfishness and self-indulgence than those stars and stripes.
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Mike Blakesley
Film God
Posts: 12767
From: Forsyth, Montana
Registered: Jun 99
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posted 01-30-2018 02:39 PM
quote: Bobby Henderson
Blue collar trades (like being a plumber, mechanic, electrician, carpenter, etc) are not "clean" jobs. Plumbing work is one of the most unpleasant out of all trades. I sure wouldn't want to be under a house in the dead of winter fixing a busted pipe while laying in a bunch of freezing water, mud and Lord knows what else.
What I was getting at is, unpleasantness or not, there are plenty of people who go into jobs like plumbing, but they want that big city fantasy life you speak of, so they go to work for some contractor and have a steady job, but they wind up working their butts off for an "hourly" wage and most of their money goes to the boss.
Here, a guy could start the EXACT SAME kind of business, make better money, and be able to set his own hours, take a week off if he wants to and when he wants to, and enjoy great quality of life. Virtually all of the contractors in town are so busy they don't even have their phone number on the side of their trucks, but they all manage to schedule in time off for hunting season or whatever. The guy who does most of the work for us at the theater has about a two-year waiting list of people wanting him to work on their houses and such.
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William Kucharski
Expert Film Handler
Posts: 244
From: Louisville, Colorado, United States of America
Registered: Oct 2012
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posted 01-31-2018 07:14 PM
quote: Bobby Henderson
My town (Lawton, Oklahoma) is not representative of all of America, but this town does speak volumes on how people in lower income and lower-middle income brackets are exploited. We have no shortage of predatory businesses who thrive on stomping their boot heels down on the necks of people struggling just to survive. I believe pay day loans operations are a puss-filled boil on the ass cheek of humanity and that these legalized loan-shark operations should be absolutely outlawed. Rent to own stores that sell furniture and appliances at hyper-inflated prices are stores that fully deserve to be fire-bombed.
I understand the animosity towards these places, but the question then becomes what would people who patronize these places do otherwise? If you're getting a payday loan you're out of other ways to access cash when you need it. If you're going to a rent-to-own furniture store not even used or IKEA furniture fits your budget.
Yes, they take advantage of the poor, but without them what would people who need cash based on an upcoming paycheck do? Underground loan sharks or other black economy options are the only real alternatives.
quote: Marcel Birgelen
What about Basic Income? I mean, if it doesn't work out the way it should work, we can still revert to Mike's plan.
Basic income, aka the "never have to leave the house again" plan. ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
quote: Mike Blakesley
One problem we run into is, our regular guy will be working on a job and he will run into what he calls "While you're here" syndrome. He'll be just about done and the customer will say "hey, while you're here, could you do this other thing?" and that ties him up for another week.
Ask any physician and they will tell you people operate this same way; they'll come in for a physical and go through the entire process, and then as the doctor is shaking their hand saying "I'll see you next year" patients will say "Thanks, Doc! By the way, I have this weird looking mole here…"
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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."
Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted 02-01-2018 12:58 PM
quote: Dave Bird
Well, I don't mean that in a cynical way, I mean it in the belief that I think people need to quit thinking that OTHER people are going to solve their financial issues via legislation or social movements. There are just simply way too many factors adding up to why $15 does or doesn't cut it for a second job. If I read you correctly, the "selfishness" of thinking you can just live however you want, have as many kids as you want with zero plan as to how to pay for that is kind of putting things backwards......oh well, it's a great vote-seller.
That's not the selfishness I'm talking about. Maybe the situation is different where you live, but I don't know of anyone surviving on minimum wage jobs who lives in a McMansion, drives nice vehicles and has all the things he/she wants. People in that wage group struggle just paying for basics.
As for the stereotype of "welfare mothers" shitting out lots of kids for more welfare cash, the money math doesn't add up there either. Even with government assistance each child born represents a net loss of income to that mother, not to mention her time and freedom. Repeating what I've said earlier: teens and young adults are getting better at avoiding pregnancy. The birth rate of American-born women in 2017 fell to a new all time low of 1.77 kids per female. A rate of 2.1 is needed to replace Americans who die. Regardless of this trend, people of certain political leanings are still tightly holding onto that welfare mother image as a common talking point.
The selfishness I'm talking about is the modern American "ethic" of making money by screwing over other people, carving it out of the backs and asses of those other people. These acts run big and small. A "small" example would be a group of people at a restaurant not tipping the server. That dick-move is shamefully common here in Lawton. We have to battle the syndrome of people trying to get something for nothing at my workplace. Then there's mass-scale screwing, such as Enron Executives forcing their employees to buy Enron stock while they were secretly selling theirs while knowing the company was financially imploding. The widespread gentrification of neighborhoods in New York City has been an investment bonanza for hedge funds, foreign investors, etc. Landlords have used all sorts of unethical tricks and criminally fraudulent acts to force low income tenants out of rent-controlled properties to cash in on the investment wave.
quote: Marcel Birgelen
What about Basic Income? I mean, if it doesn't work out the way it should work, we can still revert to Mike's plan.
Right now Universal Basic Income seems like a concept that could only work in a perfect world. It could eliminate welfare and its imprisoning aspects as well as greatly reduce the government bureaucracy tied to it. But UBI has its own drawbacks. It is not a magic bullet to fight price inflation of specific things, such as what a 2 bedroom apartment costs to rent here in Lawton versus a 2 bedroom apartment in Brooklyn.
The Kurzgesagt channel on YouTube has a beautifully animated video about Universal Basic Income here.
IMHO, it is better to have improved regulatory control over specific industries to prevent price gouging. But we're all about deregulation in America. So anything goes with how anything can be priced, even necessities like food and health care. One thing I really can't stand is some of the same people who get their panties in a twist over a higher minimum wage will do all they can to defend industries like health care when they want to price gouge the shit out of patients. I remember people trying to defend the oil industry over $4.00+ gasoline, "it's all about supply and demand." Never mind the fact speculators on Wall Street played a part in those high prices. Having to pay 2 or 3 times the normal cost to fill up one's gas tank isn't a problem for a rich person. It's hell for people in the low to middle income brackets. And it was a catalyst for touching off the Great Recession last decade.
quote: William Kucharski
I understand the animosity towards these places, but the question then becomes what would people who patronize these places do otherwise? If you're getting a payday loan you're out of other ways to access cash when you need it. If you're going to a rent-to-own furniture store not even used or IKEA furniture fits your budget.
Pay day loans are even more hazardously toxic to one's personal finances than a high interest credit card. Users of pay day loans get plunged into an ever deeper financial hole. The people who run these pay day loans companies know exactly how concepts like positive cash flow and daily accrued interest work. They know what they're doing to their borrowers and I believe that makes them just as evil as someone selling heroin. Their customers either don't know the dangerous risks of pay day loans or they're are using such loans to feed some kind of destructive impulse such as drugs or gambling. Pay day loans operations may not hire guys named "Fat Tony" to go around breaking people's legs. But they have used fuzzy language in bad check laws to toss people in prison for failing to pay back their extreme interest loans.
Rent to own stores are another scam. The weekly or monthly payments on the low-grade products they offer are higher than what you would pay financing a furniture or TV purchase at a legit store. It baffles me that anyone in Lawton would visit a rent to own store when there are so many people selling good quality used electronics, furniture and appliances on Craigslist, Facebook, Goodwill, etc.
quote: William Kucharski
Yes, they take advantage of the poor, but without them what would people who need cash based on an upcoming paycheck do? Underground loan sharks or other black economy options are the only real alternatives.
Parasitic businesses not only take advantage of the poor, but contribute very well to keeping poor people stuck being poor. Loan sharks and other underground economy operations still exist. And legal parasitic businesses routinely cross the lines of legality, such as all the pawn shops here in Lawton selling stolen merchandise. If you spot your stolen TV at the pawn shop you don't get it back for free. Here in Lawton you have to pay the pawn shop guy to get back the stolen merchandise. So you file on your home owner's insurance to get the TV replaced. Someone else buys that TV set and the pawn shop store still makes money off the stolen goods. You're really screwed if you're trying to get back a unique collector's item or something with sentimental value.
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