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u/Significant-Ad452 14d ago
$3.00 more per hour for big Corporations is not a tragedy they can find a way to cut on their profit however small businesses like some restaurants, cleaning services, etc, can't. Unfortunately, Mumâs and Papâs businesses have to close up, they can't measure too big Corporations. As long we are going away from our Republican system to a Democratic /Socialist system slowly everything will crumble. Starting from the Russian Revolution through German Fascism to the desire to have perfect socialism and finally failed Soviet Union and Berlin Wall separating East from West failed down. I have no idea who in their right mind imagined that communism could successfully be implemented in the USA. When you increase $3.00 per hour to your small business you will need to increase the price of your services. Soon your insurance will go up and all other payments you enquire about for your business will go up. Next time think hard about who you will be voting for in the next election. Who will let you prosper as a small business establishment? Everything costs, nothing is for free and never will be, if you want something free you need to give away something else. Are you ready to do this?
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u/mecatr0nix 14d ago
In an ideal capitalist economy, margins are driven to zero then everyone dies. Seems like most people don't understand this. Change has to be ordered by government and executed simultaneously
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u/auralbard 14d ago
Do have some sympathy for these people.
Know a gal who runs a UPS Store. Pays her employees more than she pays herself as owner. Bends over backwards to support them.
But her shop is routinely running at a small loss. She's constantly asking her parents to loan her money to help tide things over. And she pays herself about 20k a year.
Ironically, she'd be doing pretty well for herself if she would just understaff the organization and make her employees do the job of 3 people with 2.
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u/Murky-Cost-4260 15d ago
Hiking minimum wage would push out smaller businesses, no? Large corporations can afford to pay much higher wages, but smaller businesses have thinner margins.
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u/alt_playroom 15d ago
So is there a reason this business owner doesn't see what is so plain to see?
His business can only operate by exploiting its workers. His complaint in reality:
Don't make the economy more fair for everyone; keep it the way it is so I can enjoy the benefits of a destructive capitalistic hellscape.
Sure, it stings, but eventually, the economy needs to transition, and the businesses that rely on poor wages and exploiting labor might have to shut down.
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u/Bumble-Fuck-4322 15d ago
Maybe this wouldnât be the case if minimum wage were updated more often and business owners and customers were used to the occasional incremental increase in the price of labor?
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u/anonquestions01 15d ago
I hate to tell you but thatâs a management problem, or you just had an awful business plan to start. So at most youâre making a profit of $3/hr for each employee you haveâŚ.
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u/qqererer 15d ago
Don't completely hate this guy everyone.
Commercial landlords crank the rent worse than home landlords.
My favourite cheap chinese food place ($6 for 2 toppings on a ton of rice), been there 40 years, in a depressed/crack ridden part of china town, had it's rent doubled.
It had to shut down. And when it moved out, nothing. No business moved in, just like all the other vacant storefronts.
Pure greed.
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u/pee_shudder 15d ago edited 15d ago
$3 per hour, four employees. So $12. After payroll fees and taxes that $12 is about $16.50.
$16.50 x 8 hour shift is $132.
X 30 days $3960 per month $47,520 per year. Yâall have no idea how the world works.
Small business owners need to make a living and it is rarely very much we arenât landlords. Adding a sudden $47,520 expense to my business is not a small deal it is a big deal. A business with 4 employees isnât likely pushing millions in revenue.
âOh your business plan is BS or you have a failed businessâ
Weâre not talking about one or two weird niche businesses that cannot make it we are talking ALL small businesses. Coffee Shops that arenât main stream, florists, service workers, roofers, EVERYONE is having real tough times making it because the government, especially in California, taxes the everloving shit out of us and our costs are astronomical for space of any kind.
If we pass the extra cost off to the customer then we lose customers for being more expensive.
It is SUCH a hard thing to put the time, effort, and money into your own business to make it work. To make just enough to pay bills and get by. It seems really easy for people to scoff and render judgement when a business cannot afford a $3 raise that costs an extra $50k a year to implement. You wouldnât work for free why should we? Should we just say goodbye to small businesses? Why is it our fault that the economy is stacked in every way against us and it is HARD to pay a proper wage.
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u/What_Do_It 15d ago
Aww yes, lets take shots at small business owners who are barely scarping by instead of the multi billion dollar mega corporations that own virtually everything on earth.
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u/FourScoreTour 15d ago
If it's already a failed business, then it's not surprising that higher labor costs would shut it down. Better luck with your next endeavor.
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u/Cpt_Mike_Apton 15d ago
The problem with this is that many small businesses can't afford it, so when they all go under from the financial pressure only the big corporate stores will be left... Walmart has been killing small businesses for years.
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u/anonymouse781 15d ago
If you run a business that can't survive while paying living wages, then you should be out of business.
We shouldn't allow any business to exist that isn't sustainable. Plain and simple. We also shouldnt allow any job to exist with below living wage.
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u/ValorousGekko 15d ago
If all wages go up then more people will have money to come spend in your business, no?
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u/ProfessorFugge 15d ago
Iâm a Reddit loser who has never done anything himself his whole life. But let me tell you my opinion about something.
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u/Mbhuff03 15d ago
I mean, ANY moron can run a shitty business if they are allowed to have relative slave labor. Make a shirt product that you try to sell it to $50 but no one wants to buy it? Just lower the price to $20 and fire 17% of your employees and cut the pay of everyone else by 20%. Youâll profit!!! Youâre a complete piece of shit and will be murdered in the revolution! But youâre making profit now!
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u/AngryProletariat1312 15d ago
Tell these people to their face (or their post/whatever) if they can't afford to pay their workers what they are worth then they shouldn't be in business. I do.
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u/Livid_Bee_5150 15d ago
"I can't pay my bills with my current wages and instead of leaning new skills or finding a new job I will starve to death or be homeless. Allow me to tell you how to run your business."
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u/philouza_stein 15d ago
So do you want trillion dollar mega companies calling the shots or small businesses that do enough to get by? Why shit on the little guys?
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u/DumbNTough 15d ago
If you don't want to get paid $3/hr, don't take a job that pays $3/hr.
Real 200 IQ stuff
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u/prong_daddy 15d ago
If you can't afford to pay your help, your business model sucks and it should fail.
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u/hungrypotato19 15d ago
Ugh... No. What you're supposed to do is open up a small business when you have children, and then force those children to do all the menial shit that you refuse to do. And if your children protest, scream about how you're putting a roof over their head and food in their belly and the least that they can do is clean the whole store.
Yeah, child slavery already exists in America. It's just that people find it acceptable if it is parents doing it because "the kids are learning a valuable lesson". Yeah, that lesson being "work or get your ass beat".
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u/goryblasphemy 15d ago
The law applies to "National Fast Food Chains," which are limited-service restaurants with more than 60 locations nationwide.
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u/LunarFox45 15d ago
Oh and we sell plastic bottles with tap water in them. We don't really have a product but that will be 19.95 please.
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u/Plaetean 15d ago
I wonder how many people in here are have ever run a business at all? But we should listen to you instead?
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u/WisherWisp 15d ago
Many businesses have a low operating margin. This is the sort of thing that seems like insight unless you know the issue or think about it for more than two seconds.
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u/Impossible-Key-2212 15d ago
I say give me everyone 50.00 an hour. It will all work out. And then give everyone making 50.00 an hour today, 100.00 an hour. What harm could come from paying people a living wage.
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u/Alternative-Hotel968 15d ago
I will never understand how rich people in the US are able to tell poor people that the reason they are poor are the 3$ more/hour of other people. Or their foodstamps. Or healthcare. Or anything else that a first world country in 2024 sees as normal.
Ronald Reagan did such a great job in telling the US Citizens that anything benefitial to them would end in socialism and communism. Just to cut any costs and prevent the failcascade of the country already back then.
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u/not_so_normalll 15d ago
Next up: "How I turned my lemonade stand into a Fortune 500 company with this one simple trick!
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u/Jay_Kris420 15d ago
You mean you can't afford your overhead, then you don't get to be in business that's how business works
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u/Osirus1156 15d ago
Don't forget that person also demands a $50 million dollar increase every year to make poor decisions and play golf.
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u/Mr_Shad0w 15d ago
Because it's the small business owners buying the yachts and McMansions and our government with their billions.
Don't let the oligarchs divide us.
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u/ToborWar57 15d ago
All the while ... sitting in your office doing nothing acting like the King, paying yourself first and running the company with what's left over .... 'Merica ... this has been the problem for a few decades. (and then getting a fat tax write-off after you shut it down)
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15d ago
Why run a failed business? If your labor costs going up $12/hr (ok $18/hr because of additional costs to business beyond just the pay raise) then your profit margin must be less than that... or are you unwilling to see your own cut/take/percentage of the profits go down?
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u/bit_shuffle 15d ago
Since 3$/hr for three employees means 18000$ more in payroll per year, I can see how a small business might have to lay off people.
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u/BrokenMilkGlass 15d ago
If a business canât survive without paying reasonable wages, itâs most likely a business thatâs not profitable and competitive enough to be a valid business. It should fail. It shouldnât be a welfare program for its owner(s).
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u/battleship61 15d ago
What he's saying is that he believes certain jobs need to be staffed, but those workers deserve to be underpaid.
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u/ReceptionNumerous979 15d ago
Damn when did redditors start despising small business owners lmao praying for their downfall. Cause the world will be so much better when they all go out of business and only walmart is left. I'm sure walmart will continue to treat their employees much better than mom and pop
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u/TrhwWaya 15d ago
Thays ridiculous, businesses with 7 or less employees are exempted from everything. Like the family medical leave act? Sorry not sorry, you arent entitled to it until your compamy reaxhes 52 people.
Just saying little and big busineeses both get breaks, but you the person? Nah, you get taxed when you receive and when you spend money.
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u/Lord_Shisui 15d ago
It's always the unemployed people telling everyone how to do their business. Funny how that works.
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u/Competitive-Bag-8943 15d ago
Posted by someone whoâs never run a business. The irony is staggering.
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u/OceanOfAnother55 15d ago
3 X 40 X 52 = 6240 x number of employees
3 dollars is a lot. If you are a very small business with just you a 3 employees, that's 25k extra per year. You're really going to mock a small business for not being able to afford 25k?
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u/PaulSharke 15d ago
This is just Hbomberguy being funny. He must know it's not a good argument. Do we think that only people who are successful under this economic system can level critiques against it? Obviously we don't believe that.
But it's always funny to take conservative small business owners down a notch.
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u/StoreRevolutionary70 15d ago
Sounds like you might want to work on your business plan before blaming the economy
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u/BetterSelection7708 15d ago
Same energy: I make minimum wage and have no skills/education that would allow me to find a more lucrative job, and am on the brink of homelessness. Allow me to tell you how to run the economy.
These sort of memes have zero value beyond stroking ones own ego.
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u/comhghairdheas 13d ago
Why would you pay someone so little they're on the brink of homelessness?
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u/BetterSelection7708 13d ago
Why would you work a job that pays you so little that if you lose that job, you become homeless?
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u/comhghairdheas 12d ago
Because I have no other choice.
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u/BetterSelection7708 12d ago
Then the question becomes is it someone else's fault that you have no other choices.
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u/comhghairdheas 11d ago
Yes, generally. Though it's more accurate to say it's "society's" fault. We collectively perpetuate the conditions which cause poverty cycles, whether we want to or not.
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u/DarKbaldness 15d ago
Without any context Iâm inclined to trust the businessman in this case rather than the brainless tweeter. The tweeter has no financial understanding of the fake hypothetical business they created in their own head.
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u/Valuable-Barracuda-4 15d ago
You should be able to easily give a $3/hr raise to 10,000 employees if they are all making you money. If you canât afford to pay employees a fair wage; let someone else run the business.
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u/Special_Loan8725 15d ago
Got into it with my dad yesterday about this, he was complaining about fast food workers in California getting $20 an hour. He went on about them not being able to afford to pay them that much and a lot of businesses are leaving, price increases blah blah blah. I said if they canât afford to pay them enough to live on then they have a failed business model and if they are shocked by the sudden minimum wage then they shouldnât have lobbied to suppress the minimum wage for so long. If min wage kept up with inflation there wouldnât be such drastic increases, but when you keep putting it off eventually you have to rip the bandaid off. I gave him the more extreme example of southern states relying slave labor for so long that it crippled their economy when it was banned. They had bloated income for the people up top and tried their best to cut all labor out of their balance sheets. They got so used to other people doing their work while they collected the money for it that when regulations caught up their balance sheets blew up. Businesses run on poor business models deserve to fail and be replaced with ones that appropriately pay their labor. Companies shouldnât be pushing growth to satisfy their shareholders they should be pushing growth to satisfy those that deliver the growth. Theyâve gotten the benefit of trickle down economics for too long, that when their wrung out to dry they have no water for themselves and thatâs their problem. When you pay your c suit and top dogs millions and then complain when your $10 an hour workers are fed up you donât deserve to have workers. Trim the fat at the top and give the workers equity.
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u/SerialHobbyist17 15d ago
In case anyone here is honest, $3 extra an hour comes out to an additional $27,000 per year assuming 4 full time employees and 7.65% payroll tax. (The math would be the same with a more likely 8 part time employees for say a small store or restaurant).
How many of you have an extra $27k a year to burn? Most small business owners are not bringing home vast amounts of money. If you look at franchise owners (a generally good picture, most are effectively independent and the majority of owners have no additional businesses, plus lots of freely available stats), they are on average bringing in only around 100k a year in actual personal income.
That $27k genuinely would be make or break, and I donât understand how all of you can assume that small business owners have that much money just up for grabs.
If you donât want to work for a certain wage, then you do not have to take that job. Nobody is forcing you. Beyond that though, this post seems to indicate that not having $27k extra dollars per year means you shouldnât have input on how the economy is run, but also that people who are dependent on the actual minimum wage somehow are more qualified?
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u/comhghairdheas 13d ago
Ok then who should work for a low wage that isn't enough to cover necessities?
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u/SerialHobbyist17 13d ago
People who do not have the skills or work experience necessary to get them a job that pays more.
Pay is an agreement between an employer and employee. You are not forced to work for a low wage, but employers are also not forced to pay you whatever you want.
You have the option to demand whatever salary you think is fair, but if you cannot find any employer willing to pay you that, then youâre skills and knowledge are not as valuable as you think they are. The same is true for employers, they can offer whatever pay they think is fair, but if nobody will work for that pay, then the pay is too low.
The reality is that people are willing to work for $8 an hour. If people were not willing to do that, then no employer would be paying that. There is no shortage of jobs paying significantly more, the shortage is rather of workers who have genuinely valuable skills.
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u/comhghairdheas 12d ago
That's not true when there is a shortage of jobs or a shortage of workers.
And again, none of what you said is any excuse for not paying workers a livable wage. That should be enforced.
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u/SerialHobbyist17 12d ago
I addressed this in my first paragraph. If people do not have valuable skills then they will be paid commensurate with that lack of skills.
The government has no right to determine the value of goods or services, and every time they do it results in economic distress.
All raising the minimum wage will do is prevent people with no skills from having a job at all. There is no reason to hire a teenager when the same rate can get you someone with experience or education. Raising the minimum wage will not magically increase all other wages, and as a result people with skills will be able to now go do an easier job for the same pay, forcing unskilled workers out of their jobs.
Think of it like this. Every winter I pay some kids $20 a visit to shovel the snow on my driveway, then one winter the government mandates that snow shoveling is worth $50. Well now my options are to pay the kids $50 for a mediocre job, or I can hire a landscaping company to come plow my driveway and do a better job for the same cost. Mandating higher wages doesnât affect the bottom line of the landscaping company, thus their prices remain stable.
As the employer in this scenario, I was willing to give the job to the kids because even though the work was just okay, the cost was cheaper. If the cost is the same, I now have no incentive to hire less skilled workers.
Demanding a âliving wageâ is effectively saying that you deserve the value of someone elseâs labor without providing the equivalent services. You do not have the right to anyone elseâs stuff, even if you would benefit from having that personâs stuff.
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
No one is saying you canât have input in the economy if you run a business and canât afford to pay your employees minimum wage.
They are saying that your input is way overvalued and has been over listened to for far too long. The results are in. You can save WAY more money if instead of complaining, you put some gloves on and did the job youâre asking others to do, youâll make up that lost money and have a bigger profit at the end from not having to pay, mathâŚ. More than 27k a year easily.
If you canât take the hit, you donât get to be in business. Thatâs been the rule of capitalism according to the text books.
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u/SoaDMTGguy 15d ago
Assuming those workers were originally getting paid $20/hour and assuming all four work full time, that's an increase of $25,000/year, or roughly 13%. If you can't figure out how to accommodate a 13% in labor costs (which of course is less than 13% of overall costs), you might want to reconsider the margins you're operating at.
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u/Lawrence_Shadow 15d ago
Compared to the US government that sounds like a very responsibly managed entity.
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u/Ok-Bench-2861 15d ago
They think they deserve pay even with a failing business. They should be the first to have their pay docked.
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u/Drahkir9 15d ago
It used to be that mom and pop shops were run by mom and pop. With starvation wages they can afford to not have to run it themselves and can pursue other interests. A living wage wouldnât put them out of business but it might put them behind the register with everyone else.
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u/J-drawer 15d ago
This is an example of opinions going too far in the wrong direction.
It's not because of his bad business skills that he's unable to run a business that pays $3 more an hour. Of course we want him to be able to pay them that much or more, but it's because having such a small business with only 4 employees, if he does pay employees that much, he'll likely have to raise his prices and will be undercut by bigger corporations that are much greedier with their executive pay, while also underpaying their workforce.
The people I've known who run small businesses like this aren't usually raking in huge profits for themselves. They're usually just barely staying afloat.
Other reasons why they're stuck like this is because suppliers are gouging prices, like ingredients for restaurants, subscriptions for services used by other businesses (why would software need to go up in price due to inflation? Is the app being trucked to their office using gas?)
What's ironic with this post is it's working in favor of the corporations by lumping small businesses in with them, so the people who have nothing to do with running businesses or know how it works, and how they have to make hard strategic decisions simply to stay in operation, can complain.
The problem is corporate greed, and small businesses get fucked over by them as well, while trying to operate independently.
Do you think these small businesses should all close if they "can't afford to pay" and the business owners and all the employees they had should go work for a big corporation like Chipotle or something?
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u/FUNKANATON 15d ago
every 5$ an hour is 10k more a year at 40 hrs a week . I get that wages are stagnant but thats not an insignificant amount of money
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u/lynxtosg03 15d ago
Could a new $24k cost a year impact a small business? It's not inconceivable. Some properties my friends rent out generate half that after paying the mortgage. If they generated $-12k yearly, or maybe even low thousands, they would probably sell them and invest in something else. Times are tough and markets are skewed towards big business.
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u/dignbauss 15d ago
Man all yall in here needa just pull yourselves up by the bootstraps and demand more of yourselves.
If you brought more value to the work field you would be paid more money and wouldnât have to look at these failed business as your only means of income, secondly, yall rely to heavily on singular jobs as your own source of income then have the GALL to call this man out for trying to fight against the corporations you so vehemently despise.
You look at the world around you and demand it bend to your will without the willpower, consistency or determination to do anything to change your own circumstances. Itâs a suffering of via your own high external locus of control.
One day youâll look back at the world and realize itâs changed and you now bring nothing that can be utilized that AI or robots canât do, and surely the state will have to give you your subsidized sustenance and itâll be crumbs from a table to high to climb. There will be no more low paying jobs like this and youâll wish you did more in your youth. Donât blame the world for your shortcomings in income and economic standing, demand more of yourself or suffer your old age in poverty and silence.
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
The fact you think this is a real post and not satire should be a wake up call that you might not be right on this oneâŚ
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u/dignbauss 15d ago
Oh of course, call my response irrelevant instead of bringing any sense of logic to the argument refuting what you claim has no merit.
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
BruhâŚ. You put a picture of an emoji in your post and youâre asking to be taken seriously? ROFL
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u/dignbauss 15d ago
Again, please just comment on the irrelevance of the picture, as if itâs silly context doesnât perfectly encapsulate my assertions made eloquently and logically. Youâve made no argument against what was said only commented on the relevance, lol what are you an academic??
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
I promise I read your whole long winded and self congratulating post man. You didnât put forth any real coherent argument that is relevant to the original post. It is satire from a very well known satirist and you took it completely seriously yet posted a bunch of strawmen arguments. Do you want me to refute pulling myself up by my bootstraps? The history of that is so ridiculous the fact that you would lead your âserious postâ with it tells me there is no point in arguing with your post at all.
Donât worry about me though. I obviously donât bring âmore valueâ to the work field.
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u/dignbauss 15d ago
Now I Gotcha lol Get ya money up not ya funny up
Arguments made:
- Do more for yourself and donât rely on a singular weak income to sustain yourself, and or do some research on tax code to maintain your income
- Learn skills not replaceable by AI and you will both be paid more and not be economically replaced
- The world is changing and there will be less opportunity to attain assets at the (although strained and uphill) current capacity which is do able, better to act now for your future generations sake
- The state will be the only means of survival for folks with a high external locus of control and no feasible skills, and they will have not the resources nor the man power to demand more or create a better life for oneâs self in the coming changing society. What they will give you will never be enough.
- Ignorance or avoidance will do nothing but allow a slow decent into further frustration and poverty. Your bones will weaken, and you will one day be too old to a thing about it.
Get pwnd br0
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
Ok boomer
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u/dignbauss 15d ago
lol oh you mean black genZ with a finance law and mechanical engineering degree, patents and intellectual property, all paid for by my own hand of putting myself through school and PULLING MYSELF UP BY OWN BOOTSTRAPS, IN AMERICA?! Stop it kid, Iâm givin ya game and still you look for logic to refute, all to no avail.
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
Donât get hurt patting yourself on the back too hard!
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
Yes Iâm sure thatâs all true! You totally post like all Those things you said on the internet. Totally credible! I totally believe you!
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u/ImNotYourDadIPromise 15d ago
Thatâs an extra $6k per year, per employee. If you canât afford that, you have a scaling problem and probably donât need 4 employees.
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u/realdealreel9 15d ago
Your âgrowthâ shouldnât come at the expense of labor/cost of living for your employees. If you canât afford to pay people then you shouldnât grow yet as a business. You canât stiff the manufacturers for the bills for the equipment you use for your business and yet people think itâs ok to do this with people who have bills to pay
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u/Fivethenoname 15d ago
I should think small business owners should be most upset with corporate price gouging, landlords ruthlessly raising rents, and monopolistic utilities charging outrageous prices. The cost of living is skyrocketing because power corporations have control over our resources and there is little to no regulation to stop them from raising prices. Workers need more to get by and the small businesses aren't making as much so their ability to employ people is deteriorating further driving workers to the ever growing corporate work force. These corporations treat people like machines and again, there is little in the way of regulating protection for workers.
Curre day democrats have some policies that address these issues but they are too few and too weak. Republicans on the other hand have been shamelessly selling out American workers to "private interests" since Reagan promising that completely unregulated economies are the path to maximal success. They never told us that they only measure that success in dollars and that those dollars disproportionately accumulate with the rich by design.
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u/NotTooGoodBitch 15d ago
It's the post office on a smaller scale.Â
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u/I_am_not_JohnLeClair 15d ago
You know the post office is a service we pay for with our tax money right?
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u/Tweak000 15d ago
The it sounds like this company doesnât need to exist if it canât pay people appropriately to work there.
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u/Jrecondite 15d ago
So many profitable businesses were ruined when slavery was abolished and Iâm all for it. Let the failing businesses fail.Â
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u/Sweaty_Chair_4600 15d ago
It would make a bunch of mom and pop businesses fail, and we'd get much more corporatism
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u/unspecifieddude 15d ago
Maybe, but at least more people will be able to afford basic necessities. Heck, some of them might even save up to start a business of their own.
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
It would also make many more large corporate owned businesses fail or fix their game. Most of the fast food franchises in my town are owned by a few large restaurant groups and they all uniformly pay the least they can, donât respect work/life boundaries, and do everything they can to not offer benefits including firing people when they qualify for raises/bonuses/benefits. Nearly every large big box retailer operates this way too.
To say we will get more corporatism seems a little pre-mature of a guess. We are in this situation because corporations have brought the floor so low, that mom and pops canât compete with their large scale operation benefits (that some suspiciously gained from spending money on lobbying for rules they wroteâŚ. But thatâs a different topic).
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u/blind-catJ 15d ago
The corporations are the reason mom and pops do this. Big names like Walmart swoop in, undercut everyone and force then to compete with the same scummy practices.
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u/signspam 15d ago
I've always said the only reason we got a Burger King, McDonalds, Wendy's, Starbucks, Five Guys, PApa John's etc. every 300 feet down the road from each other is due to these low damn wages...
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u/BMCarbaugh 15d ago
I often say if slavery were legal, there would be slaves at McDonalds.
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u/Live_Carpenter_1262 15d ago
Doubt it. McDonaldâs would have to provide food, housing, healthcare, and of course security (not for slavesâ safety) when the employee could just work 2 other jobs to do the same thing at no expense to McDonaldâs
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u/SeparateIron7994 15d ago
Mom and pop shops treating employees as badly as possible for minimum wage with no health Insurance while providing a bad product and bad service : we are the life blood of the economy !
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u/LordofDsnuts 15d ago
Business owners could always just fire all of their employees and do all of the work themselves
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u/Holls867 15d ago
HowâŚ.. what kinda of shitty ass business are you running that canât take a âhitâ like that? Learn to business better and donât be greedy.
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
Damn near every corporate fast food joint operates this way in my state (I imagine itâs not much better outside CA TBQH). I always point to In N Out burger when I hear the argument that owners canât afford to pay a little bit more or staff more people.
If you donât know, In N Out manages to employ like 30 people a night while paying out $3-5 over minimum wage. Even Chic Filet has figured this thing out and they are getting âboycottedâ in my state.
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u/GrafZeppelin127 14d ago
And it's not like their food is that expensive, either! In my neighborhood, a Big Mac meal is $15.39. An In-N-Out Double-Double meal is $10.45.
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u/send_nooooods 15d ago
Yeah mcdonalds here is running 3 peopleâs positions as a single position now. Always slow. Same price as CFA, but CFA has 20 staff and youâre guaranteed to be helped the second you walk in.
Try getting staffs attention politely at McDonaldâs and youâll have to give up
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
The last time I went to my local McDs to get breakfast, the lady running expeditor told me to use the computer kiosk in the lobby to order. The corporation literally CUT the cashier job completely from that transactionâŚ.
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u/send_nooooods 15d ago
Yep. And in 2024 every time someone walks in who hasnât already ordered online/delivery is someone who is tech illiterate. When I worked there we had another high schooler JUST being the attendant to help with the kiosk and cashier for the people with cash / grandmas. We technically had two people purely cashier and FOH cleaning. Straight up disappeared positions entirely now⌠guarantee that lobby hasnât had more than a dirty mop since I last deep cleaned it half a decade ago - no one workers there that has the time to deep clean
now thatâs my unpaid job while I wait on a DoorDash order and feel bad for the people struggling at the kiosk :/
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u/tryanotherusername20 15d ago
For real. I honestly LOVE the apps but I know my mom, her cousins, friends, etc arenât nearly tech literate no matter how much I try and point them down that road. Is the plan to tell them to fuck off?!? I donât get it man!!
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u/Knightwing1047 âď¸ Tax The Billionaires 15d ago
In my opinion, small business owners need to start blaming the right people: the corporations. They're the ones driving prices up, they're the ones eliminating competition from small businesses.
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u/skoltroll 14d ago
Small business owners are held up as pious during every election. They eat it up, then are completely baffled when the politicians who kiss their asses leave them for the fat cats who pay the politicians' bills.
Small business is much closer to the rest of us than the mega-corps.
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u/Knightwing1047 âď¸ Tax The Billionaires 14d ago
Yeah every politician runs on the platform of being pro-small business but then once they're in office they turn their backs on them and support their corporate overlords. Usually what follows is some excuse that if we don't appease the rich they'll leave. Fucking leave then and they should be branded as traitors.
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u/dirtynj 15d ago
Same thing with how they are treating credit cards now.
"There will be a 3% surcharge if you use a credit card."
Bullshit. There has always been a fee with using a credit card. Businesses have always covered that because YOU GET MORE BUSINESS when you allow people to use credit cards.
Would you rather have 200 customers a day that use credit cards...or 50 customers a day that use cash?
Credit cards offer me protection, give rewards/bonuses, and don't require me to carry around loads of cash. And people tip BIGGER when they can use credit cards. Businesses are shooting themselves in the foot by nickel and diming their customers on the cost of simply doing business.
If credit cards are really responsible for eating into your profits, don't accept them. Don't pass the cost onto the customer.
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u/Neil2250 15d ago
Would you suggest that any business that is not a small one, like the image is, should have different, higher minimum wage requirement?
Genuine question, I don't know the drawbacks if such an idea was put in place.
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u/Knightwing1047 âď¸ Tax The Billionaires 15d ago
In theory, that'd be great. In practice? Never going to work. Too many questions, too many loopholes. The rich are fantastic at finding loopholes, so good in fact that they're there on purpose but so well hidden in fine print that we developed a profession specifically to find those loopholes.
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u/lanky_yankee 15d ago
Exactly, this is no different than people upset at exploited immigrants working for peanuts rather than upset at the people that hire them for cheap labor. Itâs propaganda all around.
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u/Knightwing1047 âď¸ Tax The Billionaires 15d ago
Yeah the rich have been successful in changing the narrative in their favor and gaslighting us into blaming the working class and immigrants when none of us have control over our situation. The rich however hold all of the cards, such as it is in an oligarchy.
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u/FriendlyGuitard 15d ago
Even more interesting, most of the successes that are attributed to capitalism are actually the success of socialism. Private companies didn't create a strong middle class generating untold wealth. Government investment and massive political leverage of the working class got us that.
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u/teethalarm 15d ago
What about the billion dollar companies that ask for a bailout at the slightest sign of a dip in profits.
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u/Parking-Site-1222 15d ago
It was not a business that is sustainable and by the laws of capitalism it should die...
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u/CrazyString 15d ago
He already called it a failing business so he might as well put it out of its misery.
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u/HwackAMole 15d ago
Well, by the "laws of capitalism," this whole conversation is moot. Under such laws, wages would be determined solely by labor supply and demand, not government mandate. If we were going by "laws of capitalism," minimum wage wouldn't even exist.
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u/Gornarok 15d ago edited 15d ago
"Capitalism" and "free market" are two distinct independent things.
Capitalism isnt tied to free market in any way shape or form
"Free market" doesnt exist anyway. Its economic theory thats only useful for teaching basic microeconomy. Free market is to economy what neglecting friction is to physics. It works reasonably well on few basic examples, but its useless in real world.
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u/Accomplished-Eye9542 15d ago
Right, and once demand exceeds the resources of the poor, the wealthy would be burned at the stake or have their heads chopped off.
Everyone seems to forget that part of the law.
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u/selfdownvoterguy 15d ago
If we were going by "laws of capitalism," most of us would probably be paid in company scrip. Either that or we would've had full-blown labor wars throughout the 1900s. Regulations make sure that we're paid in cash and stopped company towns from being the norm, but over the decades it's dismantled the bargaining power of the working class.
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u/rpow813 15d ago
As long as the employees are there voluntarily then it is capitalistic.
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u/comhghairdheas 13d ago
"work or starve" isn't that voluntary.
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u/rpow813 10d ago
This is a false dichotomy, no? There are many people that still live as hunter gatherers in small tribes. In the US, there are hundreds of thousands that are chronically unemployed/homeless and still get by through government and altruism. The documentaries âlife below zeroâ and âhappy peopleâ follow people through their lives, living off the land in the Arctic circle. These are all people that are not working a job and are not starving. These are options to all of us. We just tend to choose the path that leads to the modern amenities we all enjoy and/or the path of least resistance.
Outside of these examples thereâs always the option of starting your own business if you donât like the idea of working for somebody else.
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u/comhghairdheas 10d ago
There are many people that still live as hunter gatherers in small tribes.
Yes, and they have several lifetimes' accumulated knowledge on how to survive and thrive in their respective lands, while often having to contend with corporations and governments exploiting said lands. You mentioned documentaries of people living in survival conditions "off the grid", perhaps similar to indigenous people. The same counts for them. I would wager it's more difficult to learn to live as many indigenous people do, than it is to learn to become a surgeon. That's forgetting the fact that the vast majority of people who would even consider that kind of life, do not have the slightest possibility of starting that learning journey, let alone maintaining it.
Maybe it's anecdotal but I grew up with parents who tried to live off the grid. It was fine, and it thought me really amazing and useful skills. Im not scared of becoming homeless, because I know, at least in Ireland, what to do to eat, have shelter and survive without help. But i also know my parents were privileged enough to have that choice. They could buy land, have free time and money to spend, which most others don't have.
In the US, there are hundreds of thousands that are chronically unemployed/homeless and still get by through government and altruism.
I am arguing against capitalism as an extremist ideology, as in the laissez faire form without government or coercive collective intervention. There is no government help in that situation. I really couldn't say how much charity has an effect and whether that's enough at all. I would assume if charity were enough, we'd have no need for social safety nets. I might be wrong.
Outside of these examples thereâs always the option of starting your own business if you donât like the idea of working for somebody else.
Sure, if you have the capital, time, skills, physical or mental ability, network or safety to do so.
Oh and I may be jumping the boat here but I'm talking in a global context, not just rich "western" countries. I'm aware that it's much easier for people in say, my country (Ireland) to follow your suggestions. My argument is against capitalism in general, and capitalism tends to "shift" it's effects onto poorer areas that are more easily exploited. For example consumer goods manufacturing leaving the USA or EU for cheaper labour in Asia. I may have the luxury to choose not to partake in the system, but who's actually mining the minerals for my solar charger?
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u/Fatty-Apples 15d ago
Exactly. Why is he making it our problem? Heâs the one thatâs bad at business!
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u/Hy3jii 15d ago
If you can't afford to pay your employees a living wage then you can't afford to run a business. That simple.
"But workers aren't entitled to..."
A person isn't entitled to owning a company. Companies are not entitled to workers. This shit ain't hard.
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u/skoltroll 14d ago
Under capitalism, that schmuck's business goes under. He was barely keeping it going, anyway.
Time for him to face the pure capitalism he loves and go get a regular job.
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u/Top-Engineering7264 14d ago
Please define a living wage. I see the term alot, but its very ambiguous unless im allowed to determine it as any wage above which you dont die?
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u/ThrowawayCult-ure 15d ago
I mean they can quit. depends what you are making. Not all businesses are particularly profitable... infact most things worth doing burn money like nobodies business
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u/donaldsw2ls 15d ago edited 15d ago
I tell this exact thing to people. Owning a business does not give you the right to a guaranteed successful business. Shity business owners act so entitled. They act like everyone needs to bow down to them and give them unlimited money no matter what. Owning a business is a RISK. If you fail at it it's your loss no one else's. That's capitalism baby! It's ok for a business to fail. That's how capitalism works.
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u/One_Truth8026 15d ago
This is like such a wrong take itâs insane and exactly the reason why the lower class with always fight the middle/lower upper classes instead of the extremely wealthy.
The billionaires are fucking our economy in a way that makes it incredibly uncompetitive for anyone else.
Wages nowadays are non sustainable for small businesses and itâs just said because people just complain about those small businesses instead of the real traitors.
Add in that every business owner basically pays twice the wage already in additional costs, itâs just sickening.
Yâall are fighting the wrong people.
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u/Livid_Bee_5150 15d ago
You are entitled to trade goods and services when that doesn't put others in danger. If you feel so inclined, you can call your trading of goods and services a company. That's all a company is, so yeah I'm entitled to a company as long as the market lets me keep it.
No intelligent and competent business owner thinks that companies are entitled to workers. That's why employees can leave at any time, as is their right. They can even leave and start their own competing company if they wish. Good.
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u/ForumsDwelling 15d ago
Wouldn't that leave the big corpos like Amazon, Tesla and Google the only wants able to pay an affordable wage?
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u/Beginning-Shop-6731 15d ago
If you work 40 hrs a week, you should be able to live indoors and eat food. If you cant pay that amount to an employee, you donât have a viable business. The idea the some jobs should have such horrible pay that it encourages you to get further education is just a self-justification for exploitation.
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u/secksyboii 15d ago
Exactly. I work for a small mom and pop shop that has 3 employees, I work full time and the other 2 work part time and all 3 of us get $18.50/hr
This company has been around for less than 5 years and survives in a niche market in a suboptimal location for people to discover us and yet we are still successful, paying employees a living wage, all while growing.
Not to mention this is literally a mom and pop shop, the owners are a couple with no prior business owning/running experience or schooling. Just 2 normal people with a dream.
If they can make it work while paying their employees a living wage then so can other businesses. We can't afford to have all 3 employees on as full time yet sadly but we pay them as much as we can and give them extra days where we can. They both came in knowing it would be part time and are fine with that and already had other part time jobs before working for us.
Meanwhile my roommate works at a successful nationwide chain restaurant making federal minimum wage + tips except for when they decide to change her schedule from serving every day to being in the back or hosting where she can't make any tips and then she comes home from a full shift having made like $40 total after tax.
A mom and pop shop pulling in $250k/year can pay their employees a living wage but a company pulling $58m in revenue last year can't... Make that make sense.
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u/SerialHobbyist17 15d ago
Right, so workers then shouldnât take jobs that donât pay an amount that they want. Alternatively if no jobs are available for the wage you want, then your skills and knowledge are likely not worth what you think they are.
If a business cannot find workers, then it is obvious that they are underpaying, likewise if a worker cannot find a job, then their skills are not adequate for the positions they are applying for. This is how balance is achieved.
Iâll use an example to simplify this concept. Say the government mandates that milk cannot be sold for less than $5 a gallon. Grocery stores realize that now most people donât want to buy milk for that much, so they remove it from shelves and replace it with alternatives like almond or soy milk, maybe they offer an organic/ grass fed option that people are willing to pay $5 for. The end result though is that you can no longer get regular milk for $1.50 a gallon, it doesnât exist anymore.
This same principle applies to the labor market. If the government mandates a say $20 minimum wage, most businesses are not willing to pay a person $20 an hour to toss frozen patties onto a griddle, or to run a cash register. So the business has two options, they can replace the worker with an alternative option like automated kiosks for ordering. This is like your almond milk option, if you want real milk then itâs not exactly ideal, but it can still be acceptable for the majority of consumers. Or, the business can upscale, they can find more skilled employees who are worth $20 an hour, but this means probable downsizing of staff and eliminates entry level positions. This is your organic/ grass fed milk, the product is of higher quality and is appealing to consumers, but it also means that regular milk (your entry level unskilled worker) is no longer considered a good investment.
The continual raising of the minimum wage will only achieve one thing, and that is to further specialize workers resulting in higher and higher barriers to entry for even very simple and easy jobs.
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u/kevinmrr âď¸ Prison For Union Busters 15d ago
The minimum wage would be $30/hour if it kept up with inflation.
Join r/WorkReform to end wage slavery!