Smiling is dangerous for your health

Post Reply New Topic

OK, Macs was paying above the federal minimum wage, which was 6.25 I believe. The recent law was to raise it one dollar and hour, or $40 a week for full timers.

I also think that the law helps people other than those at the very bottom - If you had been on a job for a year and were making a dollar more than the minimum wage, and the minimum wage gets raised a dollar, then you are going to get a raise as well. Employers would find that those who had experience would be far more willing to quit if they were being paid the same as the new employees - why not try a new job somewhere else if the boss suddenly placed a value of zero on your experience?

£4.12ish per hour? And people in the west moan about sweat-shops in the far east exploiting peoples labour for buttons and beads...

Employers don't care about their slaves as far as I've seen; money is the only thing that matters.
If an employer doesn't legally HAVE to do something, what is the likelihood that they WILL?

and no one beleived me when i said that...

Some companies (esp. fast food) plan for high turn-over, and they design the positions to be as low-skilled and robotic as possible. Those companies are not so worried about turnover.

But many employers recognize that good employees that have experience are worth more to their business than new employees, and they are often willing to pay to keep those people. Many employers will raise wages in the brackets above the minimum when the minimum wage goes up - not from altruism or caring for their employees, simply because it makes business sense.

Yeah, well the minimum wage had been stalled for about 10 years, and then there was the issue of the drop of the dollar (minus 50% in global terms). So things did get rather bad, and £4.12 is actually an improvement over a year ago.

The current Federal minimum wage in the US is $5.85 as of 07/24/2007. It had been $5.15 since 9/01/1997. It will "rise" to $6.55 on 07/24/2008 and to $7.25 on 07/24/2009.

States, and even cities, have set their own minimum wages. In Oregon, it's currently $7.95, and in the city of Santa Fe, New Mexico, it's currently $9.50, to compensate for the high cost of living.

Anybody who thinks that anything less than around $12/hour is sufficient is out of touch (and even that is borderline).
History of US Federal Minimum Wage

Thanks for the links - I knew that an increase had passed, I was not aware of the schedule for implementing it and thought some of the steps had already taken place (I'm not at a level where it will affect me, but it may help my daughter).

The thing is that the increase was based on pre-inflation rates. Given the current increase of gas and food and their likely continued increase. I am afraid even this increase will not keep people from reaching a "true poverty" level+vs what the government seems to think is needed for subsistance. I still feel like the US is headed in the direction of the fuedal system and I can't "serf" worth a damn<--aspie joke

Much whining and complaining on this thread! It's what Aspies do best. Complain about the way things are while waiting passively for others to fix it. And if others don't fix it fast enough, Aspies complain about that. And then Aspies complain about not being given a chance to help fix things, crying foul.

Smiling is indeed bad for your health if you'd rather sulk and whimper. Grow up, people!

Theres a line in the original article which I found poignant.. "customer is king". The erroneous belief that the customer is always right. I'm just glad I get to work in one of the few areas of the service industry where the customer is not only NOT king, but invariably wrong, and virtually a criminal, frowned upon by society. Fake smiles? No need for them. Very real frowning and glaring.. almost a neccessity.

What are of the service industry are you in, MacBeth?

From your description, I can't imagine.

My place of employment is a pub and music venue on the periphery of a town centre. We are close enough to town to suffer from all the problems of a major city-centre chain pub, and all the staffing problems and "Slaughtered Lamb/Deliverance" redneck issues of a small country pub. Thus, we have no dedicated security staff, relying instead on self-regulation by the punters, the natural aggression of the four barmaids, the irish blarney bollocks of the landlord.. and me. Glowering and dead-eye stares have averted several major incidents. Fake smiles and agreeing with everything they say would have resulted in someone getting killed. A lot of the time its like dealing with a bunch of naughty obstinate children (towering idiot children with a skinful of real ale or lager.)

Luckily, due to the unpopularity of alchohol with the authorities these days.. our punters are regarded as almost subhuman by the police. They are treated with the same regard as you might treat a stray dog.. chuck it in the van and drive it to the pound... All of our staff have the legal right and responsibility to refuse service to anyone pretty much on a whim, and often as not someone will end up getting hurled out by the neck..

So, with no "customer service" training in the building at all, with all of us simply being ourselves, smiling when we want to or not.. everything runs quite smoothly, and we have a surprisingly high number of contented regulars. Even the ones we've barred or threatened with a solid kicking before.

I see. Punters = soccer players?

It doesn't seem like a friendly place, that. No legal actions taken against your establishment on account of the violence? Maybe you should get Mr. Patrick Swayze to watch over the place.

In some cases, I favour the "hands on" approach over litigations and lawyers. Some people just need to have their bell rung for their own sake.

I couldn't agree more! The the natural world is amoral, but just because that is the way the natural world is doesn't mean human societies should be based on it.

IMO the minimum wage should be $8.00 and be automatically adjusted for inflation yearly.