Fast food restaurant answer to union demand for $15.00 minimum wage?

[angwill]

OUCH! A bunch of success stories. What's the common thread? YOU WORK YOUR BUTT OFF !!!

Do you honestly think that the majority of the poor don't work their butt off too? Some come out with success stories and some don't those are the facts. Some work even harder than those in positions above them.

 

[kymom99]

Do you honestly think that the majority of the poor don't work their butt off too? Some come out with success stories and some don't those are the facts. Some work even harder than those in positions above them.

Actually I honestly don't believe they do. I work at a school that is over 80% free and reduced lunch. Many of the parents claim they don't have money for a field trip or shoes, yet the kids come to school with brand new cell phones. I am talking about 4th graders here. Sorry, but I see too much of it. I could also tell the story of a 5th grade girl who is a behavior problem who looked at the principal when asked what she wants to be when she grows up. She said she doesn't want to do anything, she will just stay home like her mom and get a check.

Expectations.

 

[OhioDisneyDad]

And starting a family is a basic and powerful human drive, not something you can realistically expect a large percentage of any population to avoid because of economic forces.

Yeah, heaven forbid that people have some common sense and self-control. Oh no, let them go at it as much as they want and, heck, pop out 10 kids by 10 different dads.

I mean what idiots were my wife and I to wait until we could actually afford to have kids and pay for them ourselves. We could have been popping them out from day one and just raking in cash from public assistance. I could have been the one in the grocery line texting on the latest iPhone, getting free healthcare and meds and then whipping out my assistance card to buy some legal pot.

I feel like such an idiot now for working while taking classes at night. I traveled for work so I could make a little more but missed a good portion of my kids' childhood. How stupid was I? I should have sat back and had my own little pity party and blamed life and the rich for all my woes.

Thanks for really opening my eyes so I now know that all that abstinence and work hard stuff was just a bunch of crap. I can hear me now, "Son, don't worry about what happens on your date because it's just your human drive and I can realistically expect you to ignore it." Good talk, son...good talk.

I weep for this country and my children's future.

 

[crazelion]

Actually I honestly don't believe they do. I work at a school that is over 80% free and reduced lunch. Many of the parents claim they don't have money for a field trip or shoes, yet the kids come to school with brand new cell phones. I am talking about 4th graders here. Sorry, but I see too much of it. I could also tell the story of a 5th grade girl who is a behavior problem who looked at the principal when asked what she wants to be when she grows up. She said she doesn't want to do anything, she will just stay home like her mom and get a check.

Expectations.

I hate break this to you. The kid probably got the cell phone HOT might have paid less than 20.00 dollars for the phone. Born and raise hood and got out because hard work. I now have several degrees. I want three kids have better life than I did.

 

[manning]

Do you honestly think that the majority of the poor don't work their butt off too? Some come out with success stories and some don't those are the facts. Some work even harder than those in positions above them.

Not as many as used to be. Just listen to the stories.

Why do you think the Mexicans come here to work?

Because we think it is beneath us to work the jobs they are willing to do. Unlike us they go where the work is.

You think we would be better off with a socialist government? Ask any eastern European who came here. They don't. My wife had an uncle who came here from Poland for a visit. At Christmas we are in a store shopping. I caught him looking around in amazement. Asked why he said:

"Here you stand in line to pay for things, in Poland we stand in line waiting for things. The shelves are bare."

Asked why he said the government controls everything.

That was a number of years ago. It is getting better, however slowly.

In 2005 we had to hire a caregiver for her mother. She was from Poland. You will be surprised how many come from Poland to do this. And the Mexicans don't have a monopoly on coming here illegally. Many come and over stay their visa. They come here to work. And they get good pay. Back then we were paying her over $100 a day plus room and board.

Her parents went there for a visit and came back with pictures. we have beautiful lawns. They have vegetable gardens. There were pictures of horse drawn flat bed wagons.

Her cousin had to go back to take care of his elderly mother who will not move. She is on a joint bank account here. We asked him if he wanted the money sent to him. He said no because they don't know if banks will close and when. when they do they lose their money.

So you think it's tough here? Go over there and live under there system.

I'd rather stay here and WORK MY BUTT OFF. At least I would have, not guaranteed, a chance of a better life.


















p

 

[angwill]

Not as many as used to be. Just listen to the stories.

Why do you think the Mexicans come here to work?

Because we think it is beneath us to work the jobs they are willing to do. Unlike us they go where the work is.

You think we would be better off with a socialist government? Ask any eastern European who came here. They don't. My wife had an uncle who came here from Poland for a visit. At Christmas we are in a store shopping. I caught him looking around in amazement. Asked why he said:

"Here you stand in line to pay for things, in Poland we stand in line waiting for things. The shelves are bare."

Asked why he said the government controls everything.

That was a number of years ago. It is getting better, however slowly.

In 2005 we had to hire a caregiver for her mother. She was from Poland. You will be surprised how many come from Poland to do this. And the Mexicans don't have a monopoly on coming here illegally. Many come and over stay their visa. They come here to work. And they get good pay. Back then we were paying her over $100 a day plus room and board.

Her parents went there for a visit and came back with pictures. we have beautiful lawns. They have vegetable gardens. There were pictures of horse drawn flat bed wagons.

Her cousin had to go back to take care of his elderly mother who will not move. She is on a joint bank account here. We asked him if he wanted the money sent to him. He said no because they don't know if banks will close and when. when they do they lose their money.

So you think it's tough here? Go over there and live under there system.

I'd rather stay here and WORK MY BUTT OFF. At least I would have, not guaranteed, a chance of a better life. p

Wow, your a little hot and bothered there. I never said anything about socialism and I didn't hear anyone else say anything about it either. My husband grew up in Germany and traveled all throughout Europe. We have family that still live there. I am very aware of what goes on there.

PS social security and medicare could be considered socialism too but you didn't mention those when talking about government control.

 

[angwill]

Actually I honestly don't believe they do. I work at a school that is over 80% free and reduced lunch. Many of the parents claim they don't have money for a field trip or shoes, yet the kids come to school with brand new cell phones. I am talking about 4th graders here. Sorry, but I see too much of it. I could also tell the story of a 5th grade girl who is a behavior problem who looked at the principal when asked what she wants to be when she grows up. She said she doesn't want to do anything, she will just stay home like her mom and get a check.

Expectations.

Boy your pretty predjudice against poor children. Maybe you need to rethink your career if you judge those you are paid tax payer dollars to teach so negatively. If you don't like thier view point why not expand it and show them the opportunities available to them and teach them they can do anything they put their mind to. They didn't ask to be born into the situation they were nor did they get to choose their role models. You are in the perfect position to help expand their horizons and instead you sound like you can't stand them and have given up on any possibilities for their future. That is really sad.

That still doesn't mean that everyone who are the working poor are like that. You are speaking about people who don't even work for minimum wage. The thread is about people who work full time and more and only make minimum wage and still can not feed themselves. Not those who choose to not work and spend their money in ways you see as unwisely.

 

[wekhogan]

Boy your pretty predjudice against poor children. Maybe you need to rethink your career if you judge those you are paid tax payer dollars to teach so negatively. If you don't like thier view point why not expand it and show them the opportunities available to them and teach them they can do anything they put their mind to. They didn't ask to be born into the situation they were nor did they get to choose their role models. You are in the perfect position to help expand their horizons and instead you sound like you can't stand them and have given up on any possibilities for their future. That is really sad.

That still doesn't mean that everyone who are the working poor are like that. You are speaking about people who don't even work for minimum wage. The thread is about people who work full time and more and only make minimum wage and still can not feed themselves. Not those who choose to not work and spend their money in ways you see as unwisely.

My SIL works at an inner city school and unfortunately sees the same things you just castigated kymom99 for. I spent a lot of time in that classroom and can verify. We're not talking every student, but enough are sporting the newest, latest and greatest of everything that it gives you a bad feeling about the state of things. You really shouldn't be making judgments on her teaching skills - many teachers do what they can do to set a good example and many more go above and beyond.

 

[wekhogan]

Had it been controlled for inflation the minimum wage would be around $10.50 today. It was never meant to be a poverty level existence. Contrary to modern political rhetoric it was meant to be exactly what the name implies - a wage that assures a minimum standard of living.

And starting a family is a basic and powerful human drive, not something you can realistically expect a large percentage of any population to avoid because of economic forces.

Raising the min wage to $10.50 is still not going to support a family.

And, respectfully, your attitude in the second paragraph really bugs me. We waited until We could AFFORD to support kids to have them. We didn't expect that the government/taxpayers should support us because I had "an urge." This attitude of entitlement is draining this country.

 

[kymom99]

My SIL works at an inner city school and unfortunately sees the same things you just castigated kymom99 for. I spent a lot of time in that classroom and can verify. We're not talking every student, but enough are sporting the newest, latest and greatest of everything that it gives you a bad feeling about the state of things. You really shouldn't be making judgments on her teaching skills - many teachers do what they can do to set a good example and many more go above and beyond.

Thanks for having my back.

I have worked 26 years with poor kids. It's not the kids who bother me. As I said before, it is the expectations of the parents. I have seen a gradual change in the work ethic of people over those years, and not a good one. If I wanted to teach kids with money I would go to a school with a different demographic. I have the education to work at any school I want. Oh, wait! Isn't that what we were talking about? My brother taught 30 years at a more affluent school, and they have their own set of challenges. I am where I need to be, but thanks anyway.

And as for the cell phone, regardless of how they got the phone, it was a working phone because my colleague found her texting her aunt in class.

 

[FairestOfThemAll37]

What about the people who do work their butt off and DON'T succeed? I know it's utterly shocking but it does happen. No one WANTS to be poor or fail in the eyes of their parents. You can't keep blaming the poor for being poor when you yourselves admit that it will be a dark day indeed when the CEOs allow anything to touch their profits. When so many of us want everyone to have the best as long as WE don't have to give up a thing. If we do? Then every man for themselves, I got mine. I'm at least willing to hear this out, look at the data, and not immediately worry about my OWN buying power. I am not so selfish as to think my hard work outdid everyone else's hard work. More simply put, there is NOT enough money out there for everyone to have the best. But we certainly don't have to let so very few have so much of the wealth that just 1% of our population has 40% of our wealth. Our bottom 80% owns a mere 7%. 80% of Americans are NOT so lazy as that. 1 in 5 children are born into poverty. That is a heckuva lot of bootstraps. So what if I can't buy that new car? Or go to restaurants as much as I used to. So WHAT if I never upgrade my 1600 square foot house or give greedy selfish companies more needless money to buy shoes before I actually need them. If we can vastly improve the lives of millions I think I'm ok with that. We aren't talking about dropping the rest of us into poverty, we're talking about trying to save the millions who are.

I don't blame the poor for being poor. But what you talk about in the second half of your post, about so what if you can't buy a new car so that somebody else can have a better life. That's socialism and news flash, it doesn't work.

The system that you so chastised in the beginning is capitalism. I don't think that my hard work outdid anybody else's and I don't think I'm selfish. I am however a capitalist and believe in free market economies. So maybe that makes be selfish because I don't think it's ok to take from some to make everybody equal. Especially when that means the government is the great regulator.

Raising min. wage to 10.10 (or whatever it may be) isn't the answer. It's much more complex then that.

Do you honestly think that the majority of the people don't want government to decrease their spending and cut down on big government? They want that as much as they want the big companies to stop hording their profits for those at the top that don't work any harder than those at the bottom of their company. The truth is that until those profits stop going into governments back pockets to write bills that benefit them and protect and increase those profits that's not going to happen. So a lot of society is holding on to raising minimum wage which is the only thing government seems willing to give.

Yes, I honestly think that a large chunk of people want MORE not less government. Everybody clamp ring that corporation shouldn't be able to do this or so and so should have to do this. That's all more government and more regulations.

I totally agree the crossover between gonvt. And big business muddies the water just like the FDA and big food. However, the whole notion of why does the CEO get so much when he doesn't work any harder than the person stocking shelves is IMO no reason to start pillaging from the top. While almost any abled bodied person can stock shelves, there's substantially less people that can manage a large corporation successfully. Market value says their skills (not they as a person) are more valuable. If everybody could successfully be a profitable CEO then the demand for that job would drop.

 

[Dakota731]

And starting a family is a basic and powerful human drive,

So is eating, but I wouldn't take someone else's food so I could eat, which is what you are doing if you are having kids before you can afford them and letting taxpayers support them with food stamps, welfare, free healthcare etc. We are not animals - most of us can control our urges.
I see it more as a generation of Americans who can't understand the word "no", and I blame that on baby boomer parents who want to give their children everything whether they can afford it or not. There are people who are months behind on their mortgages so their kids can have the newest Iphone, tablet or cellphone. What is that teaching your kids about budgets and handling money. All that teaches is entitlement.

 

[Dakota731]

CEOs allow anything to touch their profits

Sorry I want CEO's to make a profit for their companies. That is where new jobs come from, and those profits make up my IRA and retirement account.
Most CEO's and managers are people who worked their way up from the ranks by putting in long hours and dedication, so why would I want them to fail? Since when did success and profit become a dirty word in this country? Instead we've become a nation of jealous whiners who want everyone to have the same whether they earned it or not. That IS socialism.

 

[angwill]

My SIL works at an inner city school and unfortunately sees the same things you just castigated kymom99 for. I spent a lot of time in that classroom and can verify. We're not talking every student, but enough are sporting the newest, latest and greatest of everything that it gives you a bad feeling about the state of things. You really shouldn't be making judgments on her teaching skills - many teachers do what they can do to set a good example and many more go above and beyond.

I didn't castigate anyone. We are talking about working people who make minimum wage and have trouble supporting themselves and need subsidies to make it in the world. The previous poster and yourself are comparing that to poor children in a school system who's parents don't work and live on welfare. That is not the same thing. My point is if you judge those you are paid to teach so poorly how are you going to go to do that job properly? Your not so you will do the job poorly based on your outlook. So if you dislike the people your paid to do a job for why stay in that job? PS. I have taught in schools with poor children and I have worked with teachers with that attitude and have seen how they do their jobs. PS. I was not paid to judge.

 

[ponyboy]

Do you honestly think that the majority of the people don't want government to decrease their spending and cut down on big government?

It might not be the majority but it's pretty close. 49% of Americans receive government benefits. If the government were made to decrease spending then those people take a pay cut.

They just want their government money, they don't realize that it's partially the governments fault that they're in the situation that they're in.

 

[ponyboy]

What about the people who do work their butt off and DON'T succeed? I know it's utterly shocking but it does happen. No one WANTS to be poor or fail in the eyes of their parents. You can't keep blaming the poor for being poor when you yourselves admit that it will be a dark day indeed when the CEOs allow anything to touch their profits. When so many of us want everyone to have the best as long as WE don't have to give up a thing. If we do? Then every man for themselves, I got mine. I'm at least willing to hear this out, look at the data, and not immediately worry about my OWN buying power. I am not so selfish as to think my hard work outdid everyone else's hard work.

Newsflash! The job of the CEO is to increase or maintain profits for the shareholders who own the company. That is what they get paid to do. That is their sole purpose for being there. I have worked hard for everything that I have and I'm 100% against the government taking my money at the barrel of a gun to give it to the people that have less than I do.

I saved up money for years and took a big risk investing tens of thousands of dollars to start a business so that would hopefully work out and make me more money. Had it failed then all of that working and saving would have been for nothing. Instead it worked out and now I pay wages to 3 full time and 5 part time workers. I also pay thousands of dollars per year in government licensing fees and taxes to keep that business running. In addition to that, this year I'll pay over $150,000 in sales and local taxes.

I'm paying my fair share. That's three people that I pay that use that money to make their house payment and their car payment and to pay for food. How many people do you support? How much money do you give to the local government to build roads, fix bridges, run parks, pay the light bill at the schools?

The extra money that I make pales in comparison to the money that I pay out that goes to help other people or for the "common good" in the form of taxes or fees. I'm absolutely not sorry for making more money than some people and your guilt trip is totally baseless because you don't fully understand how the world really works.

Without people like me that decided to take a risk and invest their time and effort to start a business then you wouldn't have a job. That said, the point of a business is to make money, not to have employees. Nobody sits around one day and says, "I wish I had a bunch of employees to pay! I think I'll start a business!". So you can't fault a business for making money, that's what they're for. If they didn't make money then there wouldn't be any businesses at all and everyone would spend all of their time hunting and growing food and making other basic necessities for themselves.

More simply put, there is NOT enough money out there for everyone to have the best. But we certainly don't have to let so very few have so much of the wealth that just 1% of our population has 40% of our wealth. Our bottom 80% owns a mere 7%. 80% of Americans are NOT so lazy as that. 1 in 5 children are born into poverty. That is a heckuva lot of bootstraps. So what if I can't buy that new car? Or go to restaurants as much as I used to. So WHAT if I never upgrade my 1600 square foot house or give greedy selfish companies more needless money to buy shoes before I actually need them. If we can vastly improve the lives of millions I think I'm ok with that. We aren't talking about dropping the rest of us into poverty, we're talking about trying to save the millions who are.

Greedy selfish companies? Do you have an invested retirement account? Do you own any stocks or mutual funds? If so, then you're one of those greedy selfish business owners and you should probably empty your bank account and give it all to the nearest homeless person. That's who owns all of these big greedy selfish businesses out there. It's your neighbor, your mailman, your hair stylist.

I have a friend that's one of those mean greedy business owners. He's a billionaire on the Forbes list. He's over 70 years old and still works pretty much every day. He worked for every dollar that he's got and he's still working for it. Do you know what he does? He owns a huge business that every one of you on this forum know about and he employs thousands and thousands and thousands of people. He pays millions and millions and millions in taxes every year through his business. He also gives away millions to charity and he's one of the nicest most humble men you'd ever meet.

But yeah, lets take away his money and give it to the poorer people. He can just close down his business and fire all of those people. Then a few people with little houses or old cars can buy new ones. They can even all take a trip to Disney for a week and stay at the Boardwalk! Then a year later when all of that money is gone we can find some other rich person and do the same thing to them. That's a great plan!

 

[mom2alix]

Newsflash! The job of the CEO is to increase or maintain profits for the shareholders who own the company. That is what they get paid to do. That is their sole purpose for being there.

The problem is that most of them are NOT doing "what they get paid to do". Many examples are out there of CEOs continuing to walk away with unheard of compensation packages and golden parachutes despite doing a terrible job.

The very stockholders you mention have no voice in the boardrooms these days. Corporate boardrooms have become the new taxation without representation. That ostentatious CEO pay package is a tax paid by the real owners of the company, the stockholders, to compensate a "leader" based on a manufactured concept of market price. Guess who appoints the board members who vote on that executive pay package? The CEO. It is nearly impossible for stockholders to affect the choice of board members. The vast majority of stocks are managed by large, institutional investment firms. They have other interests (such as securing the company's 401K business) that preclude them from wanting to anger the CEO. That's why we have so many "rubber stamp" corporate boards these days.

We're setting our system up to fail because it currently doesn't reward good performance. Here's are a couple of really good articles I suggest you read: http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2006/07/10/8380799/
http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2011/07...th-little-success/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0

By cleverly turning the "income inequality" conversation into one about minimum wage instead of executive compensation the politicians have done exactly what they set out to do - distract people from asking why the bankers who tanked the economy are still not being prosecuted. It's all just bread and circuses.

 

[manning]

Newsflash! The job of the CEO is to increase or maintain profits for the shareholders who own the company. That is what they get paid to do. That is their sole purpose for being there. I have worked hard for everything that I have and I'm 100% against the government taking my money at the barrel of a gun to give it to the people that have less than I do.

I saved up money for years and took a big risk investing tens of thousands of dollars to start a business so that would hopefully work out and make me more money. Had it failed then all of that working and saving would have been for nothing. Instead it worked out and now I pay wages to 3 full time and 5 part time workers. I also pay thousands of dollars per year in government licensing fees and taxes to keep that business running. In addition to that, this year I'll pay over $150,000 in sales and local taxes.

I'm paying my fair share. That's three people that I pay that use that money to make their house payment and their car payment and to pay for food. How many people do you support? How much money do you give to the local government to build roads, fix bridges, run parks, pay the light bill at the schools?

The extra money that I make pales in comparison to the money that I pay out that goes to help other people or for the "common good" in the form of taxes or fees. I'm absolutely not sorry for making more money than some people and your guilt trip is totally baseless because you don't fully understand how the world really works.

Without people like me that decided to take a risk and invest their time and effort to start a business then you wouldn't have a job. That said, the point of a business is to make money, not to have employees. Nobody sits around one day and says, "I wish I had a bunch of employees to pay! I think I'll start a business!". So you can't fault a business for making money, that's what they're for. If they didn't make money then there wouldn't be any businesses at all and everyone would spend all of their time hunting and growing food and making other basic necessities for themselves.



Greedy selfish companies? Do you have an invested retirement account? Do you own any stocks or mutual funds? If so, then you're one of those greedy selfish business owners and you should probably empty your bank account and give it all to the nearest homeless person. That's who owns all of these big greedy selfish businesses out there. It's your neighbor, your mailman, your hair stylist.

I have a friend that's one of those mean greedy business owners. He's a billionaire on the Forbes list. He's over 70 years old and still works pretty much every day. He worked for every dollar that he's got and he's still working for it. Do you know what he does? He owns a huge business that every one of you on this forum know about and he employs thousands and thousands and thousands of people. He pays millions and millions and millions in taxes every year through his business. He also gives away millions to charity and he's one of the nicest most humble men you'd ever meet.

But yeah, lets take away his money and give it to the poorer people. He can just close down his business and fire all of those people. Then a few people with little houses or old cars can buy new ones. They can even all take a trip to Disney for a week and stay at the Boardwalk! Then a year later when all of that money is gone we can find some other rich person and do the same thing to them. That's a great plan!

Gee, couldn't have been said better.

Will they understand? Doubt it.

 

[Colleen27]

Not as many as used to be. Just listen to the stories.

Why do you think the Mexicans come here to work?

Because we think it is beneath us to work the jobs they are willing to do. Unlike us they go where the work is.

First of all, the stories we hear are mostly the ones served up for our consumption by media outlets with a vested interest in the status quo. We don't hear the stories of the people who work hard their whole lives and never get ahead, but we get monthly updates on some surfer dude and his taste for lobster.

And as far as immigration... Mexicans come here to work because even sub minimum wage jobs are better than what they can get back home. And many of those jobs aren't "beneath" American workers... But American workers do expect minimum wage, a lunch break, workman's comp and unemployment protections, etc. Undocumented workers, on the other hand, will accept any conditions they're presented with and have little recourse to report workplace safety or labor law violations. The "look the other way" policy on undocumented workers exerts massive downward pressure on wages as well as erecting a barrier to entry in blue collar fields that used to offer some chance to work up the ladder.

My SIL works at an inner city school and unfortunately sees the same things you just castigated kymom99 for.

The inner city "culture of poverty" and welfare queen image is only one facet of poverty in this country, and isn't at all representative of the entire subject.

And, respectfully, your attitude in the second paragraph really bugs me. We waited until We could AFFORD to support kids to have them. We didn't expect that the government/taxpayers should support us because I had "an urge." This attitude of entitlement is draining this country.

I think utopian thinking is far more damaging than an attitude of "entitlement" to one of life's primary biological drives. First of all, waiting until you can afford it presupposes that day will eventually come. For many of the working poor in this country it never will - they'll be cobbling together low wage jobs for most or all of their working lives with little opportunity for advancement or improvement. And second, it also hinges on the idea of perfectly effective birth control, which doesn't exist, or an extended period of abstinence through the reproductive years.

It might not be the majority but it's pretty close. 49% of Americans receive government benefits. If the government were made to decrease spending then those people take a pay cut

Source, please.

Newsflash! The job of the CEO is to increase or maintain profits for the shareholders who own the company. That is what they get paid to do. That is their sole purpose for being there.

And that is a major problem in our country. Not just on the issue of wages but across all sorts of quality of life measures. Companies are, at this point, essentially legally bound to externalize as many costs as possible... Let local governments deal with pollution and spills, health insurance companies bear the increased medical costs that come with such environmental conditions, taxpayers make up the difference between race-to-the-bottom wages and the actual cost of living, etc. It isn't a sustainable model.

 

[mom2alix]

Source, please.

I'm not the OP of that quote, but I was able to find it.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...ts-from-the-federal-government-in-six-charts/

The 49% figure includes retirees who receive Social Security and medicare, and Railroad Retirement Benefits as well as Military Retirees.