My Life as a Retail Worker: Nasty, Brutish, and Poor

[xchrom]

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/03/my-life-as-a-retail-worker-nasty-brutish-and-poor/284332/

?n2ar20

***SNIP

Five months earlier my ex-wife and I had a fight. I pleaded guilty to charges of second-degree assault, and signed a court order to stay away from her and her residence. Upon completion of six months of probation, the incident would be wiped from my record. But in the wake of the Politico scandal, Fishbowl DC obtained the court documents and published a piece, “Ex-Politico WH Correspondent Joe Williams Pleaded Guilty to Assaulting Ex-Wife.” Finding a new job went from hard to impossible: Some news outlets that had initially wanted my resume told me they’d changed their plans. Others simply dropped me without saying anything.

That’s how I found myself working a retail job at a sporting goods store—the only steady job I could find after six months of unemployment in a down economy and a news industry in upheaval. In a matter of months, I was broke, depressed, and living on food stamps. I had lost my apartment, and ended up living out of a suitcase in a guest bedroom of an extraordinarily generous family I barely knew. My cash flow consisted of coins from my piggybank and modest sums earned from odd jobs: freelance copy-editing, public relations, coordinating funerals, mowing lawns. So when Stretch, the laconic, 34-year-old manager of a chain store I’ll call Sporting Goods Inc. called to tell me I was hired, it was the best news I’d had in a long time. (I have chosen not to name the store or its employees here, because the story is intended as an illustration of what it is like to work in a low-paid retail environment, and not as an expose of a particular store or team.)

Of course, I had no idea what a modern retail job demanded. I didn’t realize the stamina that would be necessary, the extra, unpaid duties that would be tacked on, or the required disregard for one’s own self-esteem. I had landed in an alien environment obsessed with theft, where sitting down is all but forbidden, and loyalty is a one-sided proposition. For a paycheck that barely covered my expenses, I’d relinquish my privacy, making myself subject to constant searches.

"If you go outside or leave the store on your break, me or another manager have to look in your backpack and see the bottom,” Stretch explained. “And winter's coming—if you're wearing a hoodie or a big jacket, we'll just have to pat you down. It's pretty simple."

[Are_grits_groceries]

1. And it's all true.

I have seen it as an employee, managemant, and loss prevention.

[xchrom]

2. i've worked in retail or restaurants most of my adult life

the demeaning changes over time always startled me.

'we' weren't always treated like the 'enemy'.

[Are_grits_groceries]

3. I saw a lot of it change.

I didn't enjoy or like doing many things as a manager.

I will say this though. I saw employees caught for stealing who I never would have thought would do so. It was amazing who would steal and it was sad.

(I'm not defending the searches. I still thought they were demeaning.)

[clyrc]

4. I'm in the process of trying to find a job

Probably in retail, since that's the only thing going around here, besides call centers and truck driving. I've taken a few of the online tests for companies, and as far as I can tell, they measure two things- if you have a shred of human dignity left, and if you do, how prepared you are to watch it die. I've read the online reviews for the jobs I apply for, and they have bad ratings. But what can I do? Take the soul killing job, after I've waved goodbye to any kind of decent life, like everyone else.