If you can't pay a living wage then why you running a business

[2/325 PIR]

My thoughts and reply to all who says we cannot raise minimum wage. Yea it’s bullshit the progression till 2025

Was at local sheetz getting Sunday papers and my wife a peanut butter hot chocolate. Well they were running behind making the food drinks. And a guy in-line said they already pay the employees $15 hour they’re not getting productivity out of workers .

I did not say word as I stood in my sweats pants my carhart clearly this dude is not himself getting the benefit of our vulture capitalism at moment.

Yet he feels attempting to lift folks out of poverty is going to hurt him.

[jimfields33]

1. I'd say especially after a few years

A lot of businesses fail during the first year. But after they get going and succeed they should pay more.

[MichMan]

2. How do they even have employees?

You would think they would all leave for jobs that pay more?

[PatSeg]

8. It's possible that there aren't many

better paying jobs available or the business may have a high turnover of employees because of the low wages.

[MichMan]

20. According to some, they should just close down and put everybody out of work

[PatSeg]

21. Yeah, not the best solution

A better one of course is to raise the minimum wage. We know that not everyone will do the right thing unless they are forced to.

[lagomorph777]

22. Raising the minimum makes it easier to do the right thing (competitors also have to do it).

[PatSeg]

23. That's a good point

There are reasons why we have government and doing what people cannot or will not do on their own is one of them.

[3Hotdogs]

3. I guess it was about 5 years ago, a juice shop was opening up in the next town over.

The town is one of the highest income zip codes in the U.S., up there with Grenwich, Ct and Beverly Hills. So you can imagine what the rent must be for the store front.

So an add appears in the local website, looking for help. Here's the deal: You work FOR FREE for two weeks and if they like your work, you will get hired for pay.

WHAT A PAIR OF BALLS !

So I emailed a response that the proposal was against N.J. and U.S. labor laws and s/he would be eligible for a penalty of 3x minimum wage if said "employee" filed a complaint. The Help Wanted ad disappeared.


The shop opened up and lasted less than a year.

[PatSeg]

9. Oh my god, that is insane

It's not surprising that the business lasted less than a year. You'd think that any business owner would brush up on labor laws before they open a new business.

[mitch96]

4. "they" believe for the "business" keeping labor costs down as much as possible increases

profits.. So the perfect employee is one that you don't pay..ie a slave.
Then work up from there... The more you give the employee the less you get to keep... No wages, lo wages makes no difference.. It's all about the profit... cut cut cut.. Oh they pay way less over seas? Send the work there, increase profit.. Wages go up in that country? change countries to a place with skilled workforce and very low wages.. They don't care about a living wage...
YMMV
m

[PatSeg]

10. I've seen that so often, especially in retail

Almost always, the first thing that gets cut is "labor". Managers are constantly pressured to cut labor, as if that will increase profits, but when they cut labor, they also cut customer service and lose business. Now sales and profit are down, so what do they do? Cut labor more!

Meanwhile, companies pay their managers a salary, plus bonus, so to compensate the managers work more hours for the same pay and often end up earning less per hour than their low paid hourly employees. Talk about owing your soul to the company store. What a racket.

Really successful companies treat their employees well, who in turn treat the customers well. Also there is a much lower employee turnover, which keeps costs down.

[mitch96]

12. I've seen this also in my field of medicine... Why hire a full timer with good pay and bennies

when you can hire two or three part timers with maybe a dollar or 50¢ an hour more but no benefits. And you can send them home if there is no work or call them in if it gets busy...

I was one of those "salaried"/low hourly managers.. Yes I made more than my employees but I worked about 10 to 15 hours a week more than them so I actually made less than them... Oh and no overtime. So that was 50/55 hrs at straight time... And don't get me started on the headaches... I went back to being a "overpaid" tech...
m

[PatSeg]

13. Oh yes, that's exactly what I was talking about

The part timers often aren't making enough money to pay their bills, but their schedule is so erratic, they can't take another part time job to make up for it. And then of course, the managers are picking up the slack with no added benefit other than the possibility of a bonus. The only people who benefit tend to be upper management.

The more things change, the more they stay the same in many regards.

[mitch96]

15. "The only people who benefit tend to be upper management. "

So true.. plus you had to be a bit thick skinned, looking out for #1 kinda person. I had a mgr that worked her way thru the ranks and made it to a top position. You never saw her, she just lived on her spread sheets. She would look at the schedules in the morning and if it initially was slow... the order came down to send people home with no pay. More often than not it would get busy later on or the ER would explode and we got caught with our pants down.. Not enough employees to do the job. Frantic first line mgmt would start calling people at home so they could come in and cover.. If you did not come in, on your next review you got "dinged" and your possible raise went in the can... Effectively getting punished for having a life that did not have the hospital first and foremost. The game really sucked..
m

[PatSeg]

16. Oh yes, that is exactly how it is in

retail and restaurants too. As people move up to district or regional manager, they seem to forget what it was like at the bottom, though they are also under a lot of pressure from corporate to cut costs and increase profits. Everyone at all levels of management is competing with last year's profits and if they top those figures, they will be under even more pressure the following year. Eventually the task becomes impossible and most managers move on to another company, where they go through the same nightmare all over again.

I know what you mean about sending people home because at any given time, things are slow, but it is almost always an invitation to get swamped. With an ER, how on earth can you predict how busy it will be? There are so many factors that could send many people to the ER and being short staffed could be the difference between life and death for some patients. There really must be a better way.

[mitch96]

25. "With an ER, how on earth can you predict how busy it will be?" You can't

What she was looking at was the in-house pt sched and the outpatient sched. If they were slow, send people home... More times than not the ER would get busy and then MD's would refer outpatients for same day exam. We never said no...$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Mgmnt HATES having people sitting around waiting for patients that may or may not come. Some days you win and some days you loose. To be sure the patients will always have a increased wait time..
m

[PatSeg]

26. In essence, they've forgotten the whole purpose

of the medical community - health and healing, not profit. Our profit based healthcare is absolutely disgraceful and often deadly. In some respects, we have the best healthcare money can buy, but for so many people it is a crap-shoot.

Working in the ER must be stressful enough under even ideal circumstances, I can't begin to imagine the added stress of being intentionally shorthanded, because someone's spreadsheet says you are overstaffed.

[mitch96]

27. "health and healing, not profit". Well yes and no. You need to make money to provide services

Small rural hospitals with little to no income and small tax base just close. So you have to balance the medical part and the business part.

"we have the best healthcare money can buy"
Actually we don't. We just have expensive medical care. If you look at all the metrics other country's have better outcomes for their patients with less cost..
Too many people have their hands in the kitty looking for a profit.
m
https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2020/jan/us-health-care-global-perspective-2019
https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/quality-u-s-healthcare-system-compare-countries/#item-start

[PatSeg]

28. Yes, I agree

Obviously medical services must be paid for and there is an important administrative part to healthcare, but there is a difference between service oriented and profit oriented.

My comment "best healthcare money can buy" was rather tongue-in-cheek, meaning often only the affluent can afford it, not that it is necessarily superior. And any healthcare that a sick person cannot access because of affordability is relatively worthless. I am quite sure that the top 1% or 2% of Americans get outstanding medical care. For so many others, unaffordable healthcare is pretty much the same as no healthcare.

[TheFarseer]

5. I know I'm going to get clobbered but

I really think this would be counter-productive to jobs. You're going to see an explosion of automation and remote workers from other countries. You're going to see the end of a bagger at the grocery store. You're going to see almost exclusively self-checkout. You're going to see alot more contract work. People won't be employees. Instead they will be contractors so the company can pay whatever they want and no benefits. You are going to see more remote workers. The person taking your order at the drive-thru will be working remotely from India. If you don't do your taxes yourself, you'll have to scan your documents to someone in India and they'll do your taxes. I do think they should immediately raise minimum wage to $9 or $10.

To me, the better answer is to incentivize and/or coerce companies to bring jobs back from overseas - especially manufacturing and tech.

[hunter]

7. Businesses that can't pay a comfortable living wages shouldn't exist.

They are parasites on society, not contributing anything to the common good.

I think social safety nets should be strong enough that anyone could quit a job without fearing for their lives and the lives of their families. If this was the case abusive employers would go bankrupt.

[Happy Hoosier]

11. 100% agree

I know some ultra conservatives i say this too regularly. Theu have small businesses and pay minimum wage. They reply “have you ever had to make payroll?” No surprise you support this!”

My reply: “I am surprised that so-called “free market advocates” want the public coffers to provide basic living expenses to their employees so these so-called free market types can have reduced labor costs. He f you customers cannot afford the full price burden of your products or services, then maybe you shouldn’t be in business”.

[nuxvomica]

14. It's the same with regulations

Companies whine they can't compete if they're not allowed to pollute. Yet such regulations work in other countries. And the auto industry actually benefits from regulations that make their products more marketable abroad. The minimum wage rise actually works better as it increases the buying power of the local market and areas where it was implemented locally have seen more growth. I think the increase should go to $15 immediately with temporary tax breaks for small businesses that would be traumatized by the cost short term. Businesses have to know how to plan their budgets but at some point some people shouldn't be running a business at all if they can't survive by paying a living wage.

[KentuckyWoman]

17. Employees are just costs on a balance sheet.

Very few companies look at their labor force as an asset.

I used to be a tax accountant that specialized in businesses with under 20 employees. Most had less than 10. With very few exceptions, these business owners looked at wages and benefits as something that cut into their own salaries.

When the economy hit the fan in 2008 I cannot tell you how many businesses talked their salaried people into taking paycuts upwards of 30% in order to keep their jobs. We aren't talking engineers. We are talking receptionists and phone clerks. The owners would say, we are taking no salary to make their people feel better. In truth, they were making plenty good money. And when the economy started picking up they quietly started paying themselves again and kept telling their people life is hard.

My corner of the world was not the only one small business owners pulled this crap. When politicians say they are all for small business, I roll my eyes. I have not seen a lot of good ethics in that crowd.

Everyone crabs about the minimum wage, but they don't understand there is a reason for it. These wonderful "job creators" would not pay you at all if they could get away with it. Doubt me? Ask the day laborers who get stiffed at the end of the day.

[In It to Win It]

19. These wonderful "job creators" would not pay you at all if they could get away with it. AGREED

[In It to Win It]

18. I will start by saying I am for an increase in the minimum wage

however, I don't think it's a one-size-fits-all thing.

I've looked at thousands of small businesses where they are making $10k to $100k in gross revenue per month that operate on thin margins and they genuinely cannot afford to pay employees $15 an hour. If they do pay $15 an hour, they will have to cut back on employees or go without employees. However, I will say that with my experience and knowing this, my support for increasing the minimum wage does not decrease at all.

I understand the argument that if you pay an employee more, you should get more productivity out of that employee. That's an argument that I don't entirely disagree with. On the other end, I've seen with other people and through my personal experience that employees that are underpaid for their productivity. I think it's more often the case that productive employees are underpaid than unproductive are overpaid. That's why my support for the minimum wage increase doesn't waiver while knowing that for some businesses it might cost jobs.

[spinbaby]

24. I'm reminded of my late father in-law

He ran an extremely inefficient business that was steadily losing money, which he never really realized because his bookkeeping was so bad. He used to complain about labor costs all the time until eventually the business was operating with just him, his wife, and his daughter, all of them working for free. He still lost money and eventually went bankrupt.