[HN Gopher] Applebee's exec urges using high gas prices to push ... ___________________________________________________________________ Applebee's exec urges using high gas prices to push lower wages, sparks walkout Author : Geekette Score : 300 points Date : 2022-03-24 20:33 UTC (2 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www2.ljworld.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www2.ljworld.com) | nostromo wrote: | Ethics aside, this is bad analysis. | | Gas prices putting financial stress on Applebee's employees will | also put financial stress on Applebee's customers, who may cut | spending on things like going to Applebee's. | crackercrews wrote: | I agree they may need to cut their prices. How would this email | have been received if it had said: | | We are facing headwinds and may need to cut prices | | To stay viable this means we need to cut costs | | One way to do this is offer lower starting wages. Though this | wasn't viable in the recent past, it may be possible now. | That's because our pool of workers are feeling pinched and may | need to pick up extra jobs | | I understand he does not talk about the need to tighten the | belt on prices in his email. But obviously all restaurants have | been under pressure with COVID and inflation. It may be | understood by the recipients that they need to cut costs | wherever possible. | munk-a wrote: | I think _maybe_ workers would be receptive to this if it | weren 't for the fact that whenever there's plenty of cash | going around it doesn't loosen the belts of workers - it just | gets dumped into BS like stock buybacks. | | You can't ask for grace when you offer none. | MisterBastahrd wrote: | Wages have been going up for restaurant staff, not down, | because nobody wants such a high-stress, low-quality job. | Offering lower starting wages will end up with reduced staff | and burnout. | Traster wrote: | The core line of logic "We can pay our workers less, because | our workers are more desperate" never gets any better. It's | one thing to say they're going to pay less because the | business isn't viable at these levels of pay, but extending | that to "so we're going to focus on who we can exploit" is | where it crosses the line. Becuase if the reason you're | cutting wages is that you can't afford them... well, let's | start with that big fat juicy CEO bonus. | jasonhansel wrote: | It will also force employees to look for higher-paying jobs, | potentially causing them to leave if Applebees doesn't raise | its pay. Normally inflation is associated with higher wages, | not lower ones. | gruez wrote: | >It will also force employees to look for higher-paying jobs | | ...implying they weren't already doing so? I'm not sure about | you, but I don't think applebees is the type of place you | stick around for "the good work culture" or whatever. | wahnfrieden wrote: | I think you overestimate the mobility of a lot of these | people. For many it will push them out of work if the wages | stop covering the costs | gruez wrote: | Shouldn't it be _easier_ to look for new jobs if you have | a financial buffer? If anything being more pinched = > | more time being stressed out and/or more time at work | (trying to rack up OT) => less time/energy to spend | looking for new jobs. | ashtonkem wrote: | In fact, high transit costs might make low paying jobs like | Applebees completely untenable. Why take a job if the cost of | getting there is higher than what they pay? | archhn wrote: | These chain restaurants have always freaked me out. I know most | of the people working there are at the bottom of the barrel, but | their job forces them to feign a cheery demeanor. It's like | underclass hell--imo. | sosodev wrote: | It's interesting because I'm sure many executives think these | things. They just aren't dumb enough to put it into writing. | karmasimida wrote: | I don't understand the reasoning. | | If the inflation is up, why won't the employees demand more wage | to cover the rising cost? It isn't like Applebee is a high-sought | after career, isn't it? | colinmhayes wrote: | Economic analysis has shown the low skill labor market has | monopsony power. | https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/103530462110424... | This means the workers at applebees don't have much leverage to | demand higher wages. Their options are accept a shitty job or | don't work. This manager believes higher gas prices will force | them to shift towards the "accept a shitty job" part of the | spectrum. | savanaly wrote: | Based on the abstract you are overstating the conclusions of | that paper to a ridiculous degree. | bladegash wrote: | Think the premise is that people who work there don't have many | alternative options other than continuing to work for them. In | addition, greater financial pressures presumably contributes to | forcing them to remain employed where they already are. | | These are not employees who get paid time off and can take days | off to go looking for other jobs/interview. | | Meaning any time they take to find another job might be eating | into their finances even more, and really be more of the same | (e.g., another restaurant). | _jal wrote: | The core idea is the more desperate people are, the lower you | can push their wages. | | Same reason exploitive employers oppose increasing the minimum | wage, single payer, etc. Keeping people wretched means a steady | supply of new bodies if the ones you're employing start | thinking they can negotiate. | karmasimida wrote: | Currently it is definitely not a good time for those | employers to talk about slashing wages or adding up hours, | when there is literally a labour shortage in US. | | The talk to exploit the high gas prices to their benefits | sound nothing but delusional. | fundad wrote: | That's your BS detector tingling, they're making up any reason | to pay people less and keep more money. | | Alternatively, they're projecting more people will need second | jobs and take the lower wages if offered. | crate_barre wrote: | Is it better that this was said or left unsaid? | aluminussoma wrote: | Exactly. He is not the only person thinking this; he was just | the only one who put his thoughts on paper. I remember when | American capitalism was about succeeding by making other people | successful. This kind of business - succeeding by sucking the | blood out of your employees - should never be tolerated. | freeone3000 wrote: | When, exactly, was American capitalism about anything other | than extracting maximal value from labor? | rpmisms wrote: | Henry Ford, capitalist extraordinaire, famously paid his | workers $5 a day, double the average automaker's wage at | the time. This extracted maximum value from said labor. | gruez wrote: | I know the popular story is that: | | 1. pay workers extra (ie. above the market rate) | | 2. workers are richer now | | 3. they use that money to buy the stuff you make | | 4. ??? | | 5. profit! | | Has this actually been studied empirically? If you had to | choose between paying your workers $1000 more and | pocketing it, surely the latter option is the better one? | Sure, they might use some of that money to buy your | product, but they're not going to spend all of it, and | after your own costs (eg. cost of goods sold), you're | going to end up with less than $1000? How is that | extracting "maximum value from said labor"? | CobrastanJorji wrote: | What an odd letter. | | > Besides hiring employees in at a lower wage to decrease our | labor ( when able ) make sure you have a pulse on the morale of | your employees...Do things to make sure you are the employer of | choice. Most importantly, have the culture and environment that | will attract people. | | This is kind of amazing. Surely they know that the culture and | environment that will attract people will be the one that pays | better, right? The only thing more amazing is that some brown- | nosing sycophant managed to call it "words of wisdom" without | vomitting. | shadowgovt wrote: | > Surely they know that the culture and environment that will | attract people will be the one that pays better, right? | | No, it's the one that offers the most perks, like foosball | tables and microkitchens. Ask any successful Silicon Valley | startup. /s | giraffe_lady wrote: | This is the restaurant industry so it's more on the level of | like, the one that lets you take an unpaid day off every once | in a while. | lotsofpulp wrote: | These are businesses that operate on single digit profit | margins. And are easily replaced by eating meals at home. | They either find a way to procure cheap labor, or shut | down, because Applebees clientele do not really have the | will or ability to spend more at Applebees. | darknoon wrote: | I appreciate the quote from corporate: "We are still scratching | our head about what this gentleman was thinking." | bremac wrote: | As much as I am not a fan of Applebee's, the article title on HN | should probably be fixed. The executive who sent the email works | for Apple Central, a mid-sized franchisee with less than fifty | locations. They do not work for Applebee's itself, nor do they | represent a major franchisee. (Though in this case, it sounds | like their views aren't even representative of their own | franchise.) | rdiddly wrote: | And then he suggests doing things _"...to make sure you are the | employer of choice."_ - LOL | | So if your Chotchkies franchise is in the middle of a wasteland | where nobody can walk, bike, or take the bus to work, and then | gas prices go up, doesn't that mean people need, y'know, _more_ | money? Won 't they be looking for _higher_ wages? Paying less | just makes other employers look better and positions you to | capture exactly zero of the supposed new growth in the applicant | pool. Even _not working at all_ (i.e. not driving to a job) gains | a few preference points compared to working at your Flingers. | Seems like when they were handing out brains, this guy thought | they said trains and said "gimme a slow one." | vmception wrote: | This local franchise executive is an economist? | | From reading the full email it seems like just one sentence | lacked tact, only _maybe_ inaccurate, and the rest was .... | decent management? Like the part about making schedules for | employees further in advance so they could accomodate their other | jobs? That 's pretty good. | | The part about what employment trends will look like due to gas | prices and competing employers having to shut down? _Is that | inaccurate?_ | | Mentioning directly to offer lower wages, didn't have to be | mentioned... _that way_. | | Do I like that the managers walked out over that? Absolutely | [deleted] | tyingq wrote: | A walkout at one franchise, though I suppose the press value is | helpful. | [deleted] | rileyphone wrote: | Title is wrong, wasn't a corporate executive but instead "Wayne | Pankratz, executive director of operations for Applebee's | franchisee Apple Central LLC", from franchisee that has 47 | locations, out of 1787 total. In conclusion, this was corporate | sabotage by Chili's. | [deleted] | metadat wrote: | > Wayne Pankratz, executive director of operations for Applebee's | franchisee Apple Central LLC. | | > "The advantage this has for us is that it will increase | application flow and has the potential to lower our average wage. | How you ask? | | > "Most of our employee base and potential employee base live | paycheck to paycheck. Any increase in gas price cuts into their | disposable income. As inflation continues to climb and gas prices | continue to go up, that means more hours employees will need to | work to maintain their current level of living." | | Just wow, what a soulless scumbag. | | Not that I ever went to Applebee regularly, but seeing as how | this is the kind of person the organization promotes, I will | never return. I'd even rather starve. Utterly disgusting. | | Thank goodness for HN today, because with this broadcast I know | that by tomorrow or the next day the news feeds will be awash | with this story. | | Is it just one worm, or is this Apple is rotten to the core? | nvahalik wrote: | I think one of the overlooked pieces of the email is on the | second page. I read it yesterday so my memory isn't super | fresh. But he essentially says that: | | * they've been hiring people at $18-20/hr | | * the government pandemic aid/unemployment is dropping off and | therefore they are no longer "competing with the government" | | I think a lot of the "progress" with increasing wages was | artificially inflated by government overspending of | unemployment and COVID benefits. The people out there looking | for jobs were in a sellers market. They could get a better rate | because people were staying at home because "they could make | more on unemployment". Now we're moving back to a buyer's | market as that runs out and people are forced to re-enter the | workforce. | | While I think we can agree what he is saying here is cold, he | has an interesting point. Ultimately the government is | responsible for this and it will be interesting to see how it | impacts wages and the mid-terms given what inflation is doing. | | Personally, it seems like we are in for a "correction" in the | labor market where we will see wages go down since more people | _need_ jobs and aren't relying on government handouts. But I | think he's mainly pointing out that the wages were artificially | high and are going to lower back down. Perhaps to $12-15 an | hour? Who knows. | Schroedingersat wrote: | Seller's market is a funny way of saying they're not being | held hostage for their lives. | seneca wrote: | > Seller's market is a funny way of saying they're not | being held hostage for their lives. | | Sorry, are you saying that expecting people to work to meet | their own needs is them being "held hostage for their | lives"? | dlp211 wrote: | When they are denied the opportunity to easily obtain | better positions through structural roadblocks, I would | to an extent say this. At a minimum I would say that they | are being exploited. | mym1990 wrote: | I think thinking through the economics of the situation is | one thing, but voicing it to the people you employ is a bit | different. | nvahalik wrote: | I come at this from probably a different perspective. A | close family member has been having problems hiring people | recently. | | People want to make a minimum of $15/hr. For some small | businesses this is a hard ask. But it's complicated further | by the fact that many of the people they have hired have | walked out when they got busy. Basically, they want to be | paid to sit around and do the minimum amount of work | possible. All the while not realizing that the person who | is employing them is just barely more than they are (and | bearing the brunt of bad months by making less). | | So personally, I know that many small business owners are | definitely hoping that the market changes so that they can | hire not only quality people but at a rate that makes more | economic sense. | | In this case, this isn't some super-specialized job, it's | just a job with high variability in load and requires | (sometimes) long hours doing tedious (but not physically | demanding) work. | jhgb wrote: | > For some small businesses this is a hard ask. | | On that note, I've seem someone remark that some business | owners apparently believe that "don't buy things you | can't afford" applies to everyone but them. | HarryHirsch wrote: | Perhaps start lobbying for affordable housing and labour | rights. Right now, the only kind of leverage that workers | have is to leave, and they are doing just that. | mym1990 wrote: | I am not suggesting that the owners try to make the | economics work in an impossible way that makes them go | out of business, I know the uncertainty in this | environment is making things very difficult. But while | owners can look at aggregate data, a single worker is | looking at this as a way to survive until tomorrow. They | don't want to be made into a statistic, so the owners | should keep that to themselves. | ch33zer wrote: | OK, agree with the sentiment but: | | > I'd even rather starve | | A bit dramatic don't you think? Hyperbole and outrage doesn't | usually make for productive conversations. | dvtrn wrote: | Fasting as a form of protest is now "hyperbole", is it? | daenz wrote: | Aside from the fact that this person is a soulless scumbag, how | do you ever even get to the position of executive director | without realizing what a toxic and abusive attitude that is and | should never ever be expressed by anyone in his position? Did | he think that what he said was smart business sense? Is he that | disconnected from the average employee? I just don't understand | how it made it past all of the ethical filters that someone in | a leadership position should have, and how that failing never | manifested itself sooner. | conductr wrote: | I've been at executive level for a decade or so and am | honestly not surprised at all. | | 1) their main job is "be strategic" and as such they throw | out all kinds of horrible ideas to improve the normal | business metrics / profitability. In healthcare, I hear | things that clearly and obviously would worsen patient care | and the line "let's run that by Clinical" essentially means I | really doubt that idea deserves consideration. | | 2) they've been hit with a multitude of problems. Rising | wages is certainly the hottest topic since they were | furloughing people in 2020. They begrudgingly raised menu | prices. It continues to puzzle them where all the labor went? | | 3) as much as I hate to admit it, there might be some truth | to the point he's making regarding gas prices. I'd never put | that in writing, but it happens and is rather normalized | behavior. | kirykl wrote: | Happens all the time. Steve Jobs had several non poach | agreements which both lowered wages and lowered attrition | tablespoon wrote: | > I just don't understand how it made it past all of the | ethical filters that someone in a leadership position should | have, and how that failing never manifested itself sooner. | | Ethical filters? They're probably less likely than you think. | There's a not-uncommon idea that the _sole_ ethical | obligation of a business is to make money for its | shareholders, and this soulless scumbag seems to be thinking | that way. | | This guy's professional mistake probably just saying the | quiet part loud, not so much thinking what he did or acting | on that strategy. | wahnfrieden wrote: | This is the economic model they operate within. It's dangerous | to paint systemic issues as bad individual actors because it | gives false relief when individuals happen to appear dealt with | or reformed but the structural issues and powers remain. See | for example the false relief of On the Waterfront's ending (an | incredibly and subversively anti-worker film for this reason) | watwut wrote: | I mean, yes. | | But also, these people do have a choice. They could work | elsewhere, they could be more ethical. It is more that the | system picks and rewards people like this. | | What is often forgotten are many people who reject positions | and situations and systems like this. And work elsewhere, for | less money and less power, because they made active choice to | not be like this. | [deleted] | wahnfrieden wrote: | Does not sound like a structural solution to me | happytoexplain wrote: | It's both. There's a tendency to excuse bad behavior because | they "have to" due to systemic forces, but the system does | not have them at gunpoint. Businesses in this system can and | do survive without being ruthless and amoral right up to the | edges of legality, even when they don't reap the rewards of a | positive image because they decline to publicize such small | integrities. You're right, however, that the system is the | bigger problem. | bin_bash wrote: | It seems you're mixing up Applebee's and the franchisee that he | works for--Applebee's never promoted him. | toomuchtodo wrote: | Offtopic: These people are everywhere, which is why policy | guardrails to defend against sociopaths is so important. | colpabar wrote: | To put this another way: any argument that boils down to "the | free market will solve it" is complete bullshit because it | doesn't account for these people. | nightski wrote: | Theoretically it would (and actually we are seeing that | unfold now in the great resignation). With competition | people aren't forced to work at Applebees. In fact it's a | great time to be looking for work right now. | profile53 wrote: | Agreed. One of the things that surprised me the most working | in healthcare was how many people have a flagrant disregard | for anything but self interest -- even human life. Sadly the | policy mechanisms have failed to keep these people out. | metadat wrote: | Yes, I've been appalled by the pervasivness of the self- | interest mentality throughout healthcare. | | Anecdotally, Kaiser is easily the worst offender, not even | trying to hide it. | aerovistae wrote: | Not off-topic. Strictly on-topic. | HarryHirsch wrote: | And now you know why everyone talks so loudly about property | rights - to have people think that they are the only kind of | right that needs protection. | [deleted] | dominotw wrote: | > how you ask? | | prbly thought he came up with a genius insight | user3939382 wrote: | My open letter to Wayne would read: your food sucks, the | portions are small, and your prices are high. The service is | hit-or-miss at best. | | You've bean-counted this chain into the ground, maybe spend a | little less time looking at financial tricks on your balance | sheet and a little more figuring out how you can make food | people want to eat at a reasonable price. | mym1990 wrote: | I can hardly blame the hit-or-miss service when you have to | worker under management like this. | glitchc wrote: | Why do folks like this always end up with a sleazy-sounding name? | It can't be a coincidence. | Fargoan wrote: | Is this even real? I saw it posted on r/antiwork and it sounded | fake. | fundad wrote: | Right, What are the odds some regional manager is actually | putting this out? An investment banker would predict more | people taking second jobs as expenses rise and charge a lot for | the information. It takes analysis, skills, a budget... | endisneigh wrote: | I wonder what the USA would look like if minimum wage was defined | as; two people being able to afford a 1 bedroom apartment within | a 1 hour drive without traffic. | | The static (both in the nominal and inflation adjusted sense) for | minimum wage doesn't make sense imo. Minimum wage should be tied | to some level of living (not necessarily a great living, but | _something_ ) | | This guy smh | wernercd wrote: | That idea ("1 bed room within 1 hour") is simplistic when you | consider places like CA that have NIMBY brigades and huge | amounts of red-tape making housing needlessly limited driving | up prices with bad leadership. | | Hard to feel super supportive of massive changes to min-wage | for places that literally make affordable housing impossible. | | Growing population + massive regulation + NIMBY = you're gonna | have a bad time. | | Increasing minimum wage without fixing other issues is a ticket | to non-solutions. | throwaway0a5e wrote: | > if minimum wage was defined as; two people being able to | afford a 1 bedroom apartment within a 1 hour drive without | traffic. | | It would implode or we would adjust our standards in every | other area to make it happen. We are simply not rich enough to | afford that for everyone the way things are currently | structured. | sg47 wrote: | You should also add 'with one job per adult family member under | 65'. | deegles wrote: | A better method is to give everyone a universal basic income | enough to afford a place to live and to eliminate the minimum | wage. That way jobs would have to pay what the job is worth to | people, not amounts that create a poverty trap. | vsareto wrote: | The real estate industry would need significant overhauls | before tying it to UBI. A minimum wage increase based on | inflation would be vastly easier to get done politically in | the US and even that bare minimum still hasn't happened yet. | bo1024 wrote: | A universal basic income would have some advantages over a | minimum wage. Minimum wage interferes with supply and demand in | the labor market, which is why some economists dislike it. UBI | moves the supply curve to a different place, but it allows | those principles to function. | glitchc wrote: | 1) UBI is not UBI unless everyone gets it. | | 2) Any income surplus generated by UBI is rapidly consumed by | middle people and rent-seekers. That's how we get inflation. | tacitusarc wrote: | I do not understand what you are trying to convey through | either of these points. Would you mind clarifying? | ars wrote: | He's saying that if everyone has extra money, then | everyone can afford higher prices. | | Since they can afford higher prices, people will charge | those higher prices. And you are back where you started. | xwdv wrote: | UBI won't do anything I'm afraid, that experiment already | failed during the pandemic and now we have massive inflation | across all assets. | cortesoft wrote: | Umm, there might have been a FEW confounding factors during | the pandemic that makes the conclusion not as clear as | that. | tasty_freeze wrote: | It is very tempting to draw a straight line between | something you don't like and some other event that is | negative and declare causation. | | Do you really think this is what is causing inflation? | Perhaps there are other facts, such as trillions of dollars | of almost zero interest money injected since 2008, massive | tax cuts for highly profitable companies (eg AAPL) that | result in great payouts to people who are already paying | low taxes (long term capital gains), complex interacting | forces that moved the cost of a barrel of oil from a low of | $20 to over $100? | bogwog wrote: | UBI could allow the elimination of minimum wage entirely, | along with a ton of other scattered welfare programs that | have lots of administrative overhead and the typical | middleman industries that leech off of government programs. | | It's a no-brainer! | njarboe wrote: | Most people working for minimum wage (and probably most | people in general in the US) work pay check to pay check | (like the Applebee's manager stated in the article). They | max out their available credit so that the interest takes | up all of the possible slack in their income. Under UBI how | to you prevent people from now borrowing more money | (spending it on a vacation, clothes, fancier car, etc.), | paying all the UBI as interest and ending up back in the | same financial situation they were before. I don't think | UBI solves peoples financial problems. I think Thomas | Paine's idea of getting a large lump sum when reaching the | age of maturity has some merit. Maybe a manditory two year | service in the military or other government org after high | school and then they receive a large chunk of money to | start their life ($200k or something like that). The person | could spend it on school, start a business, down payment on | a house, wedding, etc. Having classed in high school | discussing what one should do with that money would be a | great way for students to think about the future and in a | positive way. | dlbucci wrote: | Or, you know, have a Cost of Living/Inflation adjustment every | year. That's such a simple idea to me and it's sort of insane | to me that not only is that not something that happens, but no | one seems to be even suggesting it (or at least, no politicians | are campaigning on it). Hell, adjusting the 70's minimum wage | to today's dollars puts it at like $24, so just hearing that, I | don't know how it shouldn't be around there today, but people | talk about $15 like it's crazy. | frumper wrote: | Maybe a source? I was curious and using federal minimum wages | from either 1970($1.45/hr) or 1979($2.90/hr) would yield less | than $12/hr. I know you can contest how inflation is | calculated, or use shadow stats, but then you're getting into | murky waters. The official numbers are no where near the | claim of $24/hr though. | throwbigdata wrote: | Please don't confuse the socialist agendas with evidence or | data. | boredumb wrote: | Would probably look like everyone working for the same dozen | companies. | PhileinSophia wrote: | Grollicus wrote: | There'll be a bunch of cheap singular apartments spread all | over the US - let's for convenience's sake assume they're about | a one hour drive apart from each other but that's a totally | random number of course. | | You can rent them for very cheap but just as you're about to | move in they suddenly become unavailable for whatever reason? | Probably the owner lost their keys or something and then | lawyers can argue for years if the owner is actually required | to hand over the keys. Or maybe the apartment has no way to | enter and lawyers can now argue for years if an apartment needs | to have a door? | | At least that's what I can imagine would happen. | tshaddox wrote: | > You can rent them for very cheap but just as you're about | to move in they suddenly become unavailable for whatever | reason? | | I mean, presumably in this hypothetical situation we wouldn't | want to simultaneously dissolve basic renter's rights. | glenstein wrote: | Yeah, and this is the trouble with trying to get people to | engage with hypotheticals on the internet in thoughtful | ways. | | The usual formula for any engagement with hypothetical | ideas is for it to be reflexively dismissed with a "that'll | never work" response. Most of the time I think this is the | instinctive friction we feel at being asked to engage with | a new idea, and saying that'll never work for [insert | reason] is intended not to express a counter-argument so | much as it is to reject the invitation to participate in | the exercise. | | But even in the genre of "that'll never work" responses, | this one is uniquely strange. Normally the "that'll never | work" response suggests that there's some obstacle that | arises as a consequence of the change to the status quo. | But here, it's just a list obstacles that aren't connected | to any underlying principle. It doesn't even feel like the | usual "that'll never work" response. | wedowhatwedo wrote: | You obviously don't live in Indiana....to think there are | basic renter's rights. That would be a huge win. | | I'm only slightly kidding. The Indiana legislature was "too | busy" to consider a renter's rights bill this year. They | were busy trying to "solve the problem" of transgender kids | playing on sports teams in schools. That's obviously way | more important than lower income people having affordable, | safe places to live. | tablespoon wrote: | >> I wonder what the USA would look like if minimum wage was | defined as; two people being able to afford a 1 bedroom | apartment within a 1 hour drive without traffic. | | > [imagined nonsense rules-layering] | | That won't happen for two reasons: | | 1. It requires a massive conspiracy. | | 2. Any law like the GP describes would most likely be written | to block off the exploits that it took you five minutes to | think of. Exploits that are missed can be addressed in | subsequent laws. | | Practically, a minimum wage defined like the GP's would | require a detailed census of actually-paid one bedroom | apartment rents, which would be immune to your exploits. | Spooky23 wrote: | The BLS already publishes similar statistics. It's not | rocket science. | | GSA does the same thing for travel expenses. You can | determine lodging and per diem expenses for every county in | the US. | nostrademons wrote: | Inflation, probably followed by corruption. Minimum wage would | rise to the point where a person could afford a 1BR apartment | within a 1 hour drive without traffic. Then the rents of those | 1BR apartments would rise to capture that new minimum wage. | Then minimum wage would rise to afford the new rent, and so on. | Eventually someone's going to say "Hey, I own an apartment | block downtown, I'm supposed to rent it out to the hoi polloi, | but I'll let you live there rent free if you work for me and do | exactly as I say, _wink wink_ ". | | This is a very common situation in much of Latin America - both | inflation being transmitted through CoL-indexed social goods, | and the corruption that comes from trying to bypass that. | | Any durable solution needs to address the questions of "How do | we ensure that there are enough 1BR apartments within a 1 hour | drive for everyone who wants one to get one?", "How do we | incentivize the construction of these 1BR apartments?", "How do | we maintain the desirability of these apartments once they're | built?", and "How do we prevent one firm from owning all of the | desirable 1BR apartments and setting whatever price they want?" | dv_dt wrote: | If the rent pricing exceeds the production cost of the | apartments by too high a profit margin, then a government or | regulated private entity should be formed to build them at a | reasonable margin, thus controlling the minimum wage growth. | | Alternately a large enough ratio of government controlled | units within a market could be managed to provide a market | weighting to reasonable prices. (you can see that in play in | some European cities). | glenstein wrote: | >Then the rents of those 1BR apartments would rise to capture | that new minimum wage. | | This is commonly expressed as a consequence of raising the | minimum wage, but in the most nuanced discussions of | inflation that I've been exposed to, people are mindful of | the fact that inflation ripples out into different segments | of the economy in different ways. | | I think the most reasonable outcome is that certain segments | of the economy function as shock absorbers, which take the | hit of inflation disproportionately as the economy rebalances | itself and relieves pressures on segments of the economy that | were being squeezed unsustainably hard. | | And so there is indeed a ripple effect of raising the minimum | wage, that there's more money to spend, but it radiates out | into the economy and disproportionate ways, and can be a net | benefit to wage earners because prices on critical | necessities may rise, but not in proportion to the rise in | wages, so it's still in a benefit in the end. | quantum_magpie wrote: | >two people being able to afford a 1 bedroom apartment within a | 1 hour drive without traffic. | | My immediate reaction to this statement was.. it's insane? In | my opinion it should read 'a single person able to afford a 1 | bedroom apartment within an hour of public transport commute.' | | Otherwise it sounds like you don't think anyone should be able | to live anywhere reasonable without roommates? | licebmi__at__ wrote: | It's funny that the ideals of granting everyone "life, | liberty and a the pursuit of happiness" are regarded as | wisdom, but as soon as somebody tries to ponder of what that | might be on the specific, then it's regarded as crazy. | Seattle3503 wrote: | The quote talks about the pursuit of happiness, not | happiness. | TecoAndJix wrote: | I think you need some level of opportunity to pursue, | though | [deleted] | shafyy wrote: | Exactly. Even the mindset of thinking in "driving" vs. | walking or public transport shows a lot. | XorNot wrote: | It is however realistic given the the US's urban layout and | population preferences. Also nowhere has succeeded in | keeping essential, low paid workers living near where they | work - gentrification forces them out. | daniel-cussen wrote: | That's because their work has so much value and they get | paid none of it. | MisterBastahrd wrote: | An hour? Why is it acceptable or reasonable to spend 2 hours | of your unpaid time wasted on commuting? | IMTDb wrote: | Because the only way to guarantee that people have less | than an hour of commute to their job is to create | _extremely_ dense population center which means _extremely_ | small living spaces which are almost universally hated. And | most jobs cannot be done remotely, so to guarantee that | each individual has space, he must accept to be some | distance ways from the hub where people concentrate to | perform their daily tasks. | | Think of how many people a big hospital employs, and how | you'd need to organise living center if all of them had to | have a reasonable living space within few minutes of | commute. Now you need stores and restaurant there as well | _and_ the space to host the workers of these places too, | etc. The only way is to build huge tower hosting tons of | small appartements, kill all green areas to gain as much | space as possible. People don 't seem to like that idea | that much. | bee_rider wrote: | Also, you'd think the people with 'traditional values' or | whatever would be really excited if a single worker could | support a couple. | astrange wrote: | Dual-income families are because of equality, not poverty. | When women earn nearly the same pay, it's worth it for them | to work (and hire childcare) because then you can use the | money to buy stuff. | | When they don't work, it's because it wouldn't allow the | household to buy more stuff on the margin - but rather than | "spouse earns so much their income doesn't matter", it's | more likely "they wouldn't earn enough to pay for the | childcare they have to hire". Which is a bad thing. | Aeolun wrote: | This sounds to me like they want to be able to provide for a | SO? | jpcfl wrote: | >Otherwise it sounds like you don't think anyone should be | able to live anywhere reasonable without roommates? | | I think your confusing "should be able to" with "shall be | able to, enforceable by law". | | I don't expect that a 15 year old working his first job as a | fry cook at an Arby's should be compensated enough that he | can afford to live on his own. In fact, that could be | dangerously disincentivizing his hard work toward his | education. | tinco wrote: | Well thank Reagan for ruining the honest living wage | forcing your lazy ass to go to college instead of wasting | your talent as an Arby's fry chef. | daniel-cussen wrote: | Those college cardboards are talismans. I was looking in | the Stanford bookstore and saw the following description | on a box: | | PRESIDENTIAL Masterpiece Diploma Frame in Jefferson with | Black Suede & Premium Silver Wood Millet Mats - Stanford | U | | $249.00 | xboxnolifes wrote: | This rationale is always based on the fact that a | "teenager" doesn't need a livable wage. The problem with | this, is that not every fry cook is a teenager that doesn't | need to pay for food and shelter. Fast food is a $300bn | industry in the US. It doesn't need to be subsidized by | parents. | monkeybutton wrote: | Pay should scale with the value of work produced, not the | perceived "worth" of the worker. You argue with a | hypothetical teenager. But what about my racist and sexist | hypothetical uncle who owns an Arby's? | ramones13 wrote: | But should a 27 year-old fry cook make enough money to live | alone? Labor is labor. Pay shouldn't be less because it's | going to an acceptable to abuse class of person. | Bermion wrote: | Why shouldn't someone working as a fry cook be able to live | on his salary? It's not dangerous to have a system where | not everyone needs a university degree to earn a living. | ars wrote: | Think about that. Let's take your world, the fry cook can | live on his salary. Now the person with a University | degree can command a much higher wage since his skill is | in great demand. | | He's got more money, so he can afford more expensive | stuff, increasing demand, which increases prices, and now | your fry cook can no longer live on his salary. | | Do you want to respond by raising wages again? You're in | a never ending loop. | namecheapTA wrote: | He didn't say that no one should live reasonable places | without roommates. He said that the few percent of people | making the lowest wages in the country might have to have | roommates. | srjek wrote: | That was also my first reaction, but an alternate reading is | that it's two people living on the (minimum) wages of one | person. | monkeybutton wrote: | Perhaps the assumption is of a couple living together? Also | known as: shack up and produce offspring/future worker bees. | endisneigh wrote: | Yes, that's what I was assuming here | foolfoolz wrote: | living alone is a luxury all over the world. i don't think | it's good to expect minimum wage will afford you a luxury | style of living. we don't have the infrastructure to support | that for all. nor does any country | imgabe wrote: | Mass confusion. Every location has to have a custom minimum | wage based on the local real estate market? How are you going | to enforce that? | | How about people figure out how much money they need to afford | the lifestyle they want and then get a job that pays that much? | all2 wrote: | The US Department of Defense already has a Cost of Living | Allowance (COLA) calculated for most of the United States, | large parts of Germany, and large parts of Korea. | | The work is already done. | imgabe wrote: | That takes into account the specific set of apartments | within a 1 hour drive of each individual work location in | the US and automatically updates as apartment rents | fluctuate? | Wowfunhappy wrote: | If this was a real law, lawmakers would definitely need | to flesh out the requirement beyond what an HN commenter | presumably spitballed in a couple minutes or less, yes. | As written, the requirement also doesn't account for | factors like public transit. | | But I do think the idea has merit. | nathancahill wrote: | Even further, the US State Department has a COLA for any | city it has an embassy or consulate in the world. But it's | for a diplomatic lifestyle, not for minimum wage workers in | the US. | gunfighthacksaw wrote: | > Every location has to have a custom minimum wage | | I think the federal structure of the USA lends itself nicely | to that problem. | | There would be an issue in extremely heterogeneous states | like Washington or California, where the big cities on the | coast are known for being expensive while the interior is | often cheaper, less desirable and subject to snobbery, as in | the case of Bakersfield which I have never heard anything | good about. | imgabe wrote: | States and even cities already do set their own minimum | wages. I don't see how further complicating the issue by | requiring each individual building to consider the | apartments available within a 1hour drive radius to figure | out what their minimum wage needs to be. | philipsunrise wrote: | For a lot of people, the lifestyle they want is "a place to | live" and getting a job that pays that much is impossible. | Wowfunhappy wrote: | That was my initial reaction, but the more I think about it-- | is it really so unreasonable? Right now, we force employees | to deal with the burden of ever-changing real-estate markets. | Why not make employers do that? | | And if it's too much of a hassle for your business, just pay | your employees substantially above the minimum. | imgabe wrote: | Most people are more than capable of dealing with the | burden of managing their personal finances and budgeting. | The more responsibility you want to shove off on | institutions to take care of for you, the greater you | increase your dependence on them and the more susceptible | you make yourself to their control. | SketchySeaBeast wrote: | I suppose people are poor because they are irresponsible | and it's important they remain that way for freedom is an | interesting take. | johnrob wrote: | Without debating the merits of said concept, the effect would | be to (finally) boost the supply of housing, and find a way to | transition (decouple?) stored wealth from real estate assets to | something else. | [deleted] | gruez wrote: | > I wonder what the USA would look like if minimum wage was | defined as; two people being able to afford a 1 bedroom | apartment within a 1 hour drive without traffic. | | More labor being "outsourced" to cheap counties, for one. | Rather than a restaurant making meals on site, they'll do most | of the prep work 50 miles away where the CoL (and minimum wage) | is cheap and truck it in. | tshaddox wrote: | I'm pretty sure any restaurant in the United States that | prepares meals on site does so because that's a crucial part | of the product they're offering, not because it's cheaper to | prepare the meals on site. | s1artibartfast wrote: | If it is a crucial part of the product, some restaurants | will switch products and others would go out of business. | exac wrote: | Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't it be better for the | environment if all the produce is delivered in one trip, | verse the environmental cost of 50 employees driving 100 | miles / day? I'm assuming the LCOL employees live close to | the factory. | babelfish wrote: | Places like Applebee's already do this... | bun_at_work wrote: | Unfortunately, adding complexity to legislation often makes it | impassable. This is especially true now, with the increased | polarization in our politics. | | Some variation of your suggesting is better than what we | currently have for minimum wage. However, getting that through | congress seems impossible, IMO. | Schroedingersat wrote: | Nah, | | Make it one bedroom per adult (so 1 bed apt for one, or 2 bed | for 2, whichever is more) with a 30 minute commute in peak hour | (by any means), as well as enough left over for a deposit on a | similar home in 5 years for 20% lvr assuming current property | value growth continues. | thepasswordis wrote: | >I wonder what the USA would look like if minimum wage was | defined as; two people being able to afford a 1 bedroom | apartment within a 1 hour drive without traffic. | | It would look like both minimum wage, and rent/real estate | prices going directly to infinity. | golemiprague wrote: | tenebrisalietum wrote: | >I wonder what the USA would look like if minimum wage was | defined as; two people being able to afford a 1 bedroom | apartment within a 1 hour drive without traffic. | | A lot of stuff would be automated or simply not exist. I don't | see how high minimum wage can "work" to solve social issues if | companies can choose between not hiring people and paying a | high minimum wage. | munk-a wrote: | If automation was free it'd be here already. Automation | creates high skilled jobs to manage the automation - it can | be a significant labour save but the way healthy economies | work that freed labour is going to find some other service to | offer. | woah wrote: | I wonder what the USA would look like if zoning laws were | defined as: Issue building permits until people can afford a 1 | bedroom apartment within a 1 hour drive of work without traffic | kube-system wrote: | It would look like somewhere between $7.25 - $725/hr, depending | on their circumstances. | ALittleLight wrote: | I think there should be an exception for people who are | financially dependent on someone else. If you're a teen living | at home you should be able to work for whatever someone will | pay. | bobro wrote: | why? | munk-a wrote: | To distort the labour market and make it harder for adults | to actually bargain with their employers for a reasonable | wage - I'd assume. | karaterobot wrote: | Everybody is giving you theoretical answers, but I am literal | minded. | | So, according to some website, Miami, FL is the most expensive | real estate market in the country, and Florida has a fairly low | minimum wage currently. So, I'll work with that. | | I assume that a 1 hour drive without traffic puts you at most | around 55 miles (freeways are faster, city streets are slower, | but this is an estimate). | | That could put you in places like Belle Glade, Florida, where | the 1 bedroom apartment listings are between $400 and $650 per | month. | | But, it could also put you in the much nicer West Palm Beach, | Florida, where (according to Zillow Fair Market Rent for ZIP | Code 33401) the average rental for a 1 bedroom apartment is | $1274 per month. | | Divided between two people, that's $637 per month. If we go | with the rule that 1/3 of your wages should go to housing, that | means you'd need to make $1911 per month to afford that | apartment. If you worked 40 hours a week, and there are (on | average) 4.3 weeks per month, that means you'd need to make | $11.11 per hour to afford that apartment. | | According to this other random website, the average hourly wage | in Miami is $21 per hour. The minimum wage in Florida is | currently $8.65 per hour. | | In summary, if they took the least generous interpretation of | your rule set (the Belle Glade case) they could safely lower | the minimum wage. If they took the most generous (the West Palm | Beach case) they would need to raise it by about $2.50 per | hour. | | The average wage across the U.S. is about $27, and 2/3rds of | people make "at least" above $15/hour, so it may not affect | most people at all, _ceteris paribus_ , and making the | assumption that the example region is a useful example. | | This is all very hand-wavey and back of the envelop, of course. | elil17 wrote: | God a one hour drive without traffic is like a inhumanely long | commute | | Interesting thought though | shadowgovt wrote: | Apparently, a little under 1 in 10 US workers have a 1-hr- | plus commute time (https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/ | library/publicatio...). | bcrosby95 wrote: | That's with traffic though. | | I live about 45 minutes from downtown LA without traffic. | Which turns into 2.5 hours with traffic. | kbelder wrote: | My commute is 45 minutes without traffic... 46 minutes | with traffic. (I live in Oregon.) | mrfusion wrote: | You should include traffic in it. | bloaf wrote: | Employers would pay apartment owners to keep a below market | apartment "available" but turn down all applicants, then use | that below market price to justify arbitrarily low wages. | wnevets wrote: | >I wonder what the USA would look like if minimum wage was | defined as; two people being able to afford a 1 bedroom | apartment within a 1 hour drive without traffic. | | Slightly smaller yachts for the executives. | gruez wrote: | >Slightly smaller yachts for the executives. | | Yeah, it will result in lower real income for executives | ...along with anyone that make more than 3x the poverty | threshold, per CBO's report: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_wage_in_the_United_Sta. | .. | paulpauper wrote: | there are way more expenses besides that. it will never be | enough without creating problems . Rather than putting the onus | on business, just fire up the brrrrinter. | munk-a wrote: | I am failing to understand what that second sentence means - | can you de-meme it a bit? | brightball wrote: | I know this won't be popular but minimum wage shouldn't exist. | Basic income, sure but not minimum wage. Every discussion of | minimum wage blames employers for something that is completely | out of their control: inflation. When the price of gas, housing | and food rises the business where you work doesn't suddenly | have more money to hand out. If anything their costs have gone | up too reducing what they can afford to pay out. | | It blows my mind that people continue to act like rising costs | are the fault of their employers, who have no control of it at | all. | | No doubt, this exec in particular was a moron who deserves to | be fired for even suggesting what he did but the overall | sentiment just doesn't jive for so many businesses that are | getting squeezed harder and harder everyday. | tssva wrote: | Hmmmm, how could a business possibly compensate for increased | costs including labor costs? | brightball wrote: | By raising prices and further cementing inflation across | the board, which will be passed on to other people and | other business to persist the effect even further if they | don't lose customers because of the price increases. | | It sounds so simple to just raise prices, but if it were | that simple it would have happened long before. Especially | on the lower end of the consumer goods and services market | the price sensitivity of people is sky high. In grocery | stores companies chose to shrink their products and hope | people didn't notice rather than increases prices for that | exact reason. | | It gets passed along somewhere and in the end the more | people who decide to "just raise prices" the worse the | problem gets. | ars wrote: | Think about the positive feedback loop you are proposing here: | | Minimum wage goes up -> everything costs more -> minimum wage | needs to go up some more. | | So labor expense grows and grows, while expense for "stuff" | becomes a smaller and smaller part of that. | | So how do you make that stuff? You can't hire anyone - too | expensive. So either automation, or buy things from other | countries. This means firing people. | | Your proposal will lead to mass unemployment. | | But it gets worse, since you've tied your numbers to the cost | of housing, and cities have the most expensive housing, people | won't be able to live in the city (no jobs available that pay | enough). | | So mass migration to places with lower housing, until the cost | of housing in a city goes down. What's you've done is | incentivized everyone to kind of spread out in a diffuse way to | keep down the cost of housing. | | But where are the jobs in these places? There are no service | jobs, since services are too expensive for anyone to buy. You'd | have to drive more than an hour to find a job. | | People will respond by demanding rent control, but that also | means less housing is available. | | So not only did you cause mass unemployment, you also caused | mass homelessness. | wccrawford wrote: | That's not nearly enough detail for the setting of the wage. | Companies would simply assume that they always eat the cheapest | food, buy the cheapest transportation, never go on vacation, no | luxuries at all, etc etc. If you don't factor all that in, | they'll factor it out. | TaylorAlexander wrote: | > Companies would simply assume | | This could be defined by local governments with additional | standards not written in to this internet comment. | aksss wrote: | Nothing stops a local government, to my knowledge, or a | state government from raising minimum wage for the unique | conditions their locale faces and the ideals they want to | reflect. People too often think about federal minimum wage, | but think about how diverse the environments are that | federal minimum wage affects. If you live in a city/state | where the minimum wage is lower than you think it should | be, you'll probably have better luck changing local | conditions rather than trying to boil the ocean that is the | US with 350m people and an enormous landmass consisting of | the densely urban and sparsely rural, the rich coastlines | and wealthy mountain resorts to the impoverished hill | countries. | tartoran wrote: | Even with all that factored in, and even with skipping meals, | not traveling anywhere minimum wage does not afford one a | roof over their head. Maybe with hours of commute it could | start working out (if far away remote places are considered) | but commute time is not included as wage and commute also | costs money so it breaks the equation again. But CEOs are | getting insane paychecks and bonuses. | wowokay wrote: | I don't think commute should factor into this discussion at | all. People choose to live in expensive urban cities, why | not move to a cheaper place? The point of opportunity is | that everyone has it, but people that take advantage of it | and succeed get chastised while other people who don't wish | to apply themselves get angry. Then add children on top of | it and you have people with multiple kids living on minimum | wage who feel entitled to earn more money because of their | poor choices and family planning. | Schroedingersat wrote: | Still a great deal better than the current situation. | Currently if you do all that stuff and have room mates you | might break even. | | I'd be here for using the same standards as rental agencies | do though so it's actually possible to get a place: 3x the | rent of 1 bedroom for one full time job. And make it within | 30 minutes during peak hour (by whichever means is fastest). | Also if they cite a train as their fastest, then no car or | license requirements on the job and no penalizing anyone if | the train is late. | | If they want to be feudal lords, they can at least have the | bare minimum responsibilities that actual feudal lords had. | sokoloff wrote: | The word "afford" is doing a lot of work there. Is paying 40% | of gross income for rent "too much"? 35%? 30%? What if | utilities were included vs not? 10th percentile rent? 25th | percentile? | toomuchtodo wrote: | Pics of email: | https://twitter.com/vote4robgill/status/1506666976344784900 | grover35 wrote: | Hopefully this is the moment we realize that capitalism is really | not serving us in any meaningful way. As long as we have enough | people brave enough to quit and take to the streets the working | class might have a fighting chance at ending their exploitation. | ivan_gammel wrote: | As far as I can see, one particular flavor of capitalism works | quite well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_market_economy | | It's not like bad things do not happen, but the system | continuously checks the balance between employee and employer | interests and adjusts. | colinmhayes wrote: | This isn't capitalism's fault, it's just human nature. Every | economic system will have scumbags who try to exploit other | people for personal gain. | cardiffspaceman wrote: | Achieving the optimum economy by allowing human nature to do | its thing was supposed to be the way capitalism works. To me | that would mean including scumbags, somehow the invisible | hand would create paradise. | colinmhayes wrote: | I don't think any economic system can create paradise. Some | are certainly better at optimally distributing scarce | resources though. | vkou wrote: | Paradise is here, it's just not evenly distributed. | daenz wrote: | And capitalism's main advantage is that tries to account for | the scumbag human nature (competition) and attempts to use | that to its advantage (creating an economy that strives to be | efficient). Other systems pretend like that human nature | doesn't even exist, and everything will be fine if we ignore | it. | metadat wrote: | Unfortunately only some of us have realized this, and there is | no clear path forward yet. We still have a long, long way to go | to achieve meaningful improvements. | vlunkr wrote: | One guy that works for a franchise of an increasingly | irrelevant restaurant chain has a bad take in a private email | conversation and you think this is the end of capitalism? | mbostleman wrote: | Capitalism punishes this behavior, as it did here. The market | worked as we would expect and hope. | rat9988 wrote: | No it doesn't. Your example only works because information | gets leaked. And market can only absorb that much | information, unless you put special regulatory bodies. And | "punish" is still to be seen here. | FredPret wrote: | Capitalism is a system, this guy is just a participant. Make | him famous and turn the system against him. | | I'm a dyed-in-the-wool ubercapitalist, and I hate scarcity- | focused, race-to-the-bottom companies and people like these. | It's a question of values and approach to life. | subpixel wrote: | If I were King of America, the tax code (and other financial | instruments I can't think up on the spot) would reward companies | based on the degree to which they enrich their rank and file | employees. | InitialLastName wrote: | Start off by charging them extra in taxes to cover any welfare | their full-time employees qualify for. | | edit: with a 200% penalty for administrative fees. | gruez wrote: | >Start off by charging them extra in taxes to cover any | welfare their full-time employees qualify for. | | Isn't this equivalent to raising the minimum wage? I'm not | sure what's the point of policies like this other for the | cathartic effect/grandstanding. | gruez wrote: | >would reward companies based on the degree to which they | enrich their rank and file employees. | | How would this work? How is this different than a payroll | subsidy or the EITC? | tartoran wrote: | You never hear about lowering bonuses or executive paychecks. Why | is that not revolting people anymore? | yalogin wrote: | This is textbook example of a bad manager. These kind of people | are the reason why employees leave. The person should be removed | from that position and made into an individual contributor. | rekabis wrote: | The Parasite Class cares only for profit. Human suffering? Let's | leverage that! Let's use that as a form of control, to extract | even more profits! | aerovistae wrote: | stonemetal12 wrote: | I saw this on Reddit yesterday, the comments were much worse. | | In this thread there is a mention of Ethics, and even a post | that shows the thinking of how someone could write the email | without being Satan's brother. | giraffe_lady wrote: | Having someone in here arguing for the ethics of this sort of | thing is _not_ better. Just because it looks like we all | follow an official style guide in here doesn 't make what is | said here automatically _better_. It has to do that on its | own merits, and as long as "arguing persuasively for evil, | as a thought exercise" is considered a good thing here that | can't happen imo. | | Civility and debate themselves are not virtues! What purpose | do they serve for us? What are we doing here? If you want to | make an argument that we're superior to reddit you need to | make it on more than the aesthetics of the prose bc that | isn't shit in the end. | warent wrote: | > Please don't post comments saying that HN is turning into | Reddit. It's a semi-noob illusion, as old as the hills. | | https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html | naoqj wrote: | He didn't say that hn is turning into reddit, he ist talking | about this particular thread, and at the moment that he had | posted the comment, I would have agreed with him. | thehappypm wrote: | I agree as well. This particular thread oozes the classic | eat-the-rich trope that dominates Reddit and doesn't match | the culture here. | aerovistae wrote: | Fair enough. I do already know that rule, honestly, I'm a | long-time user and I've seen others fall into the trap of | that thinking many times. It just happened to occur to me | with this thread. | [deleted] | [deleted] | mxkopy wrote: | I don't think the reasoning of this individual deserves any | other consideration than disgust. | aerovistae wrote: | Sure. I agree. But a thread-full of that disgust doesn't have | any value as a conversation. We already all know how we all | feel about this sort of treatment of other people, it's a | given. | mxkopy wrote: | Sure, but discrediting the disgust on the basis of it being | valueless has a similar effect of discrediting the | positions that disgust is based on, especially when you | aren't adding value yourself. Mention some solutions! | Otherwise you're just talking about HN vs reddit in a | thread about vile corporate practice that is very real and | serious. | [deleted] | warent wrote: | This is the reason why communities like r/antiwork are so | massive. The sad fact is that working class people who don't | possess rarer skills are frequently mistreated this severely. In | other words it's much easier for a sociopath to exploit unskilled | labor than skilled labor. This in my opinion is part of the | responsibility of the government which they've been largely | failing at lately, it's supposed to balance businesses so they | don't just throw humans into the furnace to keep the wheels | turning. | jasonhansel wrote: | At least he was being honest. | | I think that many corporate executives have thoughts along these | lines: they want employees to be so desperate that they'll accept | low wages and bad working conditions. That is, of course, why | they tend to campaign against e.g. minimum wages, food stamps, | and reforms that would make it easier to unionize. | | The only difference is that other execs have the good sense not | to put such thoughts in writing. | mateo1 wrote: | Yeah, this guy clearly hasn't worked in a company big enough to | know he has to translate this to corporate speak for all | written communications. | slantedview wrote: | The only reason this new story became a problem for Applebees was | the suggestion to exploit high gas prices. But the suggestion to | hire people at lower wages is par for the course, unfortunately. | oh_sigh wrote: | The title should be "An email urging lower wages for new | employees due to higher gas prices sparks walkout at Lawrence | Applebee's", per HN guidelines. | | The user-created title is also incorrect, because it was not an | Applebee's exec, it was the director of operations for a company | that franchises Applebees who wrote the email. | | I also find it interesting that the author of the email doesn't | even get a smidgen of credit for his parting paragraph: | | > "Your employees that live check to check are impacted more than | the people reading this email. Be conscious of that. Many will | need to work more hours or get a second job. Do things to make | sure you are the employer of choice. Get schedules completed | early so they can plan their other jobs around yours. Most | importantly, have the culture and environment that will attract | people" | | I don't think the author is a bad person. He was just caught | treating a certain business expense like one treats other | business expenses, except in this case it is the wages of the | employees and so looks wrong. Many people are of the mind that | businesses aren't charities, have no need to pay their employees | anything more than the employees accept, and through free | association, if you accept an offer, that means you agree with | the terms of the offer. | | In my mind: If you don't like the wages Applebees will pay, then | don't accept a position at Applebees. Maybe there are huge | structural problems with society forcing your hand, or maybe | you're just a skill-less deadbeat, or maybe Applebees is shooting | itself in the foot by not offering high enough wages, but | regardless, that is not Applebee's responsibility to pay you more | than what they view your labor as worth. | WestCoastJustin wrote: | Your suggested title is too long for submission. Sometimes you | need to use your best judgement in applying the HN guidelines. | bjterry wrote: | The headline is deceptive as written. It's an executive at an | Applebee's franchisee with 47 restaurants, not the chain | itself. | dlp211 wrote: | This is a distinction without a difference. I don't care | that different Applebee's are managed by different groups. | | It never ceases to amaze me the way that people with any | type of power treat and think about people with less power. | oh_sigh wrote: | That's fine, but the title should at least be factually | accurate if the user is going to write their own. | WestCoastJustin wrote: | Yeah, makes sense. I agree with you. | dragontamer wrote: | Reading down to the later parts of the article, this sounds like | a bad game of telephone from upper-management to middle- | management. | | Central Applebee management puts out vague message about | inflation affecting costs and revenues. That hiring managers need | to work harder to retain their employees by giving potential | employees more flexible schedules (which may have a benefit of | cutting costs: some employees may be willing to take a lower pay | if they can have a different schedule). | | Some middle-manager reads that statement as having to do with | gas-prices making prospective employees more desperate for a job. | | And the rest is history. | | ------------ | | Upper-management always issues vague strategic-level statements. | Its the middle-managers who have to translate the vague | statements into something that connects with the lower-level | employees. This middle-manager colossally failed at the job. | orky56 wrote: | The whole point of minimum wage is to ensure that employer wages | to employees to exceed some level of poverty. If there is still | flexibility within the wage amount, then the floor needs to be | raised higher so the employer can't play within this gray space. | tenebrisalietum wrote: | This thinking seems to assume that employers are unable to | choose how, when, and where they employ people. At some point | it's cheaper to automate the job than hire someone to do it, or | simply put money into higher ROI generators. | pipeline_peak wrote: | Normalize releasing shady internal executive emails | patientplatypus wrote: | sudden_dystopia wrote: | Regional manager is not quite "exec" but disgusting email non the | less. | darth_avocado wrote: | Rising gas prices mean we can lower wages to keep employees? | | Outside of the moral implication, this doesn't even logically | make sense. | | People are already facing higher costs, if you pay them lower, | they will not work for you, because you know, commuting to work | at your place will eat into the budget. | throwaway0a5e wrote: | The logic only works because we're coming out of a period where | workforce participation fell off a cliff. | | Rising CoL because of energy and inflation -> people need the | jobs more badly -> more labor available -> reduce wages | | And before anyone tries to score a few easy points building a | strawman, I'm just explaining the logic. I'm not endorsing it | or saying it's ethical. | ch33zer wrote: | Many people will have no choice, they're force to work wherever | they can at whatever wage they can get. | V-eHGsd_ wrote: | > Outside of the moral implication, this doesn't even logically | make sense. | | If I'm reading his point correctly ... He's saying there _was_ | an employment crunch, and companies were competing with each | other for employees by raising wages. He supposes that an | increase in gas prices means that people need more money, so | there are more employee hours "to go around". Therefore, | companies don't need to compete as much with each other to | attract employees, so they can go back to not paying as much. | awa wrote: | I think the point was since the stimulus money has stopped | they don't have to compete with the government and with | inflation these folks will need to find a job. | ashtonkem wrote: | This reeks of motivated reasoning on behalf of the manager, | as this analysis makes absolutely no sense. | ffggvv wrote: | there is a point that with inflation, people who thought | they could retire are now realizing they are going to need | more money and having to unretire. | elliekelly wrote: | They'll also eat at Applebee's less. This exec seems really out | of touch with who the typical Applebee's customer is and how | much money they earn. | jabbany wrote: | The idea is that they think of themselves as a labor monopsony. | They are foreseeing an increase in supply (due to higher living | costs forcing more people into the labor market, either those | not previously working or those who are now taking on second | jobs) and thus plan to accordingly reduce the price (wages). | | The main fault in their reasoning is the belief that higher | living costs necessarily results in more people getting into | the labor market. | | At some point the marginal benefit to a worker becomes zero or | negative, where higher living costs can actually result in a | reduction in the labor pool. Whether we are at that point | though, is not known yet without more information about the | localized economy. | juancb wrote: | Those with exploitative mindsets have learned over time that | it's easier to take advantage of those who they see as weak and | desperate. | 22c wrote: | See also: employees on a sponsored work visa | mistrial9 wrote: | a 7-11 franchise in New York USA was convicted of modern | slavery, using a non-citizen laborer and adding unpaid | hours and duties.. iir | sammalloy wrote: | I just don't understand how Mr. Pankratz's opinion is considered | acceptable in modern society. It's 2022. Isn't it time for | humanity to evolve past this kind of thing? Why are we as a | civilization still mired in a culture of exploitation and | incentivizing suffering? | matrix12 wrote: | This is a very common end result of many policies that claim | otherwise. He's merely describing it openly. e.g. Gas cars idling | for miles of backup on the freeway, as the rich $100k car races | past in the HOV lane. | mywittyname wrote: | > "Most of our employee base and potential employee base live | paycheck to paycheck. | | Including store management. | zitterbewegung wrote: | I believe the opposite is happening for people who do ridesharing | / taxi drivers and delivery services . | eatonphil wrote: | I don't think it's an Applebee's exec it's an Applebee's | franchise exec. Unless I'm misunderstanding. | cardiffspaceman wrote: | I agree with this interpretation. Notice that "Apple Central" | is referred to at least once. | [deleted] | lotsofpulp wrote: | The former will get more clicks. | sonotathrowaway wrote: | I think the article said it was from a regional manager. That | counts as an Applebees corporate exec. | azinman2 wrote: | Not when it's a franchise that affects a small portion of | their stores. | [deleted] | InitialLastName wrote: | Actions of the franchisees reflect on the brand (that's the | point of franchise agreements). In case I want to avoid giving | this guy money (as is my right as a consumer under capitalism), | how can I easily confirm which franchises his company owns? I | can't, you say? Well, next time I want to eat mediocre food in | a bland corporate environment, I'll have to go to Chili's | instead. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-03-24 23:00 UTC)