Do People Just Not Want To Work Anymore?

[Deleted]

I’ve been seeing and reading articles about how so many places are hiring, but people are so lazy that just collecting the unemployment benefits they’ve received during this pandemic is preferable to working.

When I see these articles on FB and read the comments, many people argue that the reason so many places are having trouble finding employees is because they don’t pay enough. And a lot of people have not been willing to risk their health and/or lives, and the same of their loved ones, to work a job that pays poorly. Say what you want, but I understand that and empathize with people wrestling with that kind of decision.

I’ve worked throughout the pandemic, at a job that I have to physically be present to do. My risks only come from my coworkers since I don’t deal with the public, but I still consider it a significant risk since I work in a building that has several hundreds of employees working there. Many people at my job have tested positive during this time. We currently have a few dozen employees out over 3 shifts in my part of the building because so many tested positive for COVID recently. We have an area with the entire crew out on 2 shifts.

But my salary and benefits are not easily replaced unless I maybe learn some shit or learn how to do some shit. And even with that, I’m still likely to lose financially and benefit-wise for a while (maybe forever considering my benefits) if I start over somewhere else, even with a shiny new degree or whatever. So that’s been my incentive to continue showing up for work during the pandemic. I can’t honestly say what I would’ve done with a job that paid a lot less with fewer or none of the additional benefits I have.

Where I live, I do see a lot of “we’re hiring” signs. But they’re mostly at restaurants, retail stores, and corner stores/gas stations….. places that are not known to pay much.

Most of the angst about being unable to get employees seems to be coming from the restaurant industry though, where it’s common practice for servers to be paid less than minimum wage and the servers  have to rely on tips to make up the difference. I can understand how it’s possible when people with experience as servers say that with the occupancy limits during the pandemic, it’s not worth it to work in that kind of situation. Fewer customers allowed in a restaurant means fewer opportunities for tips, so even less income…… which is very bad when the restaurant doesn’t even pay them minimum wage, I get that.

The comments I just read on an article on the subject made me wonder if maybe we might be at or close to some sort of crossroads when it comes to how restaurants pay their employees, particularly servers that don’t even make minimum wage. But restaurants aren’t the only places that can’t get employees right now.

The lady at the gas station near my house that I frequent asked me a couple weeks ago if I knew someone that needed a job because they desperately need help.

Why do you all think so many low paying jobs are having major problems getting employees these days? Is it because most people are lazy and prefer to live off the current unemployment benefits, or is it because people are fed up with working for very little money? A combination of both? Or something else entirely?

[Lizard Queen]

Those places have always had higher turnover. Then, like you said, add safety fears &/or higher unemployment payments, those places are going to feel any shortages first.

[billisonboard]

We had quite the discussion of this on the Vacinated thread. It got going on reply 1254 (page 42) and continued for I am not sure how many pages. Here is a link to that page ymam.proboards.com/thread/64446/vaccinated?page=42&scrollTo=3254539

[Deleted]

A lot of people can't go back to work for the simple reason that there's no one to take care of their kids.

There are places that are offering fat signing bonuses, at least $15/hr, one place that's offering to pay two years of tuition at a community college. Um...they're crying that they're going broke, but now they have money for signing bonuses, etc.? Why is it that they couldn't do the same before the pandemic? Especially the big corporations. They had and still have plenty to pay their CEOs multi-million-dollar bonuses and generous dividends to their shareholders.

On-site daycare at no or little cost to the employees
Paid-for benefits like health insurance
A living wage...even $15/hr will only help those who live in LCOL areas

It's way past time for the haves to take a little less for themselves and leave a little more for the ordinary folks.

And maybe the big corporations could actually pay a fair share of taxes.

[Deleted]

May 10, 2021 18:13:07 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

We had quite the discussion of this on the Vacinated thread. It got going on reply 1254 (page 42) and continued for I am not sure how many pages. Here is a link to that page ymam.proboards.com/thread/64446/vaccinated?page=42&scrollTo=3254539

Thanks for the link. I haven’t read much on that thread, so missed that discussion. My apologies if I was beating a dead horse with this thread. 

Now I have to go read what was said there. 

[Deleted]

A really sharp "think-outside-the-box" guy I used to work with spoke of the "half-life" of a profession, i.e., how long does it take for half the knowledge you have in your field to become obsolete? If you're a web designer or a nuclear physicist it can be pretty short. If you're a retail or food service worker you could drop out for far longer and then drop back into it and maybe learn some new cash register software. So, extended unemployment may not be all that attractive to people who need to stay current but more attractive to people who can find another job whenever they want to get back into it.

And, as missrigby noted, the closing of schools and the sudden need to have a responsible adult at home has really thrown families for a loop, especially single-parent and two-career families. I really don't know what I would have done when DS was in grade school if he'd had to be schooled at home, although I suppose my work could have been done from home with today's technology. The Ex would have been useless during the years we were married and after that I was on my own. I probably would have tried to home-school DS and work as well and it would have been a mess. So, yeah, someone in that position could be tempted to stay home if they could get by on unemployment. I had a giant mortgage so it wouldn't have been an option for me.

[billisonboard]

May 10, 2021 18:28:57 GMT -5 @pinkcshmere said:

May 10, 2021 18:13:07 GMT -5 billisonboard said:

We had quite the discussion of this on the Vacinated thread. It got going on reply 1254 (page 42) and continued for I am not sure how many pages. Here is a link to that page ymam.proboards.com/thread/64446/vaccinated?page=42&scrollTo=3254539

Thanks for the link. I haven’t read much on that thread, so missed that discussion. My apologies if I was beating a dead horse with this thread. 

Now I have to go read what was said there. 

I think its going to be very significant for the future so not a dead horse at all.

[Deleted]

May 10, 2021 18:15:14 GMT -5 @missrigby said:

A lot of people can't go back to work for the simple reason that there's no one to take care of their kids.

There are places that are offering fat signing bonuses, at least $15/hr, one place that's offering to pay two years of tuition at a community college. Um...they're crying that they're going broke, but now they have money for signing bonuses, etc.? Why is it that they couldn't do the same before the pandemic? Especially the big corporations. They had and still have plenty to pay their CEOs multi-million-dollar bonuses and generous dividends to their shareholders.

On-site daycare at no or little cost to the employees
Paid-for benefits like health insurance
A living wage...even $15/hr will only help those who live in LCOL areas

It's way past time for the haves to take a little less for themselves and leave a little more for the ordinary folks.

And maybe the big corporations could actually pay a fair share of taxes.

I agree with almost everything you said here, and I was wondering if what’s happening now is a rebellion of sorts, for people that can make due with whatever income they have now, without working for crumbs from major corporations. 

I see small business owners differently. If they’re still trying to grow their business, I understand that they might not be able to compete with larger businesses and corporations in regards to pay and benefits. But I suppose even they need to offer something to appeal to good employees if that’s what they need and want.

[nidena]

I found this to be a great article about the situation: www.huffpost.com/entry/worker-shortage-unemployment-benefits_n_609056c3e4b09cce6c21a850

I've been on a few threads on FB, discussing this, especially that the minimum wage should be at least double what it is currently.  However, I do NOT think it should be doubled immediately.  You can't make up for a decade of stagnation in one fell swoop.  So many are saying "prices will go up if you raise the minimum wage" and that frustrates the hell out of me because do they not realize that prices have ALWAYS gone up?  Now, prices are going up because there is a poop-ton of demand for the bits and pieces that go into bigger bits and pieces that go into much bigger things.  You know, that whole Supply Chain concept.  That was already pretty terrible from last year and then much of it was further effected bit freezing weather.

Yes, there are a lot of stores and businesses closing but I see, on FB, posts for new stores and businesses that are OPENING.  

I think it would bode well for the govt to raise the minimum wage to $8 this year.  Then $9 and $10 next year.  Getting to $15 by 2025.

So many think if you raise wages by $1/hr that each item will go up a $1 as well.  I wonder if they realize that people get internal raises every year?

I posted this this weekend on FB:

I see these posts about Unemployment and how raising wages will make prices go up. Folks, prices have already gone up. I remember when I started at Victoria's Secret in 2006.

The bottles of lotion were $9 each. I think I started there making $6.24/hr. Minimum wage at that time was $5.15. By 2015, those same bottles were $14 each. That's nearly a 50% increase in price. Minimum wage had increased to $7.25 in 2009. As for me, I was making something like $8.30/hr. NINE years and my pay had gone up $2/hr.

In July of that year, VS decided to start everyone at $10/hr. Did I receive any sort of compensation for my time already invested? No. So, I was salty but I was cool, too, because I was making more. I actually left a few months after that because I realized that VS teaches incorrect methods for sizing bras but that's a whole other tangent.

Back to those lotions. You know how much they are now? $18 each. 100% increase since 2006. I'm sure the starting wage at VS is still $10. And minimum wage is still $7.25.

And don't tell me that VS had to let people go because they increased their starting wage to $10. When I started at that company, they were in the process of remodeling all their stores to white tile floors and off-white cabinets. They've since remodeled again, to black tile floors and dark cabinets.


Infrastructure is a far bigger expense than wages.

[dannylion]

It's probably not surprising that restaurants and retail establishments are having trouble hiring.  In addition to low pay and minimal or no benefits in many of those jobs, they all involve a high degree of interaction with the public.  That interaction often involves reminding the public of rules or mandates regarding masks, social distancing, building capacity, and other issues related to the pandemic, etc. 


What we have learned from the public's compliance with and reaction to restrictions during the pandemic is that the public in many places is basically a collection of angry morons with the manners, emotional maturity, and self control of feral toddlers.  They choose to mistake inconvenience for persecution and take out their perceived grievances on those they consider to be low-status people, which often means that restaurant and retail workers are not only facing health risks from possible coronavirus infections from unvaccinated angry morons but also actual physical peril from enraged angry morons, some of whom turn to violence. 


It is likely no wonder that people are not rushing to take advantage of those jobs under the current circumstances.  

[thyme4change]

After 30 years of working continuously, if I got laid off and was replacing a significant amount of my salary with benefits, I would take a little time off.

[billisonboard]

May 10, 2021 18:43:11 GMT -5 thyme4change said:

After 30 years of working continuously, if I got laid off and was replacing a significant amount of my salary with benefits, I would take a little time off.

Am there, doing that. Plus my wife is a grocery store worker in an area with poor mask compliance and no store management push. So I am doing all the cooking except when she is sick of my limited menu, laundry, housekeeping, and anything else to ease her stress.

[resolution]

The schools out here are still requiring all kids to learn from home at least one day per week. They keep floating the idea of permanently having Wednesdays as a virtual learning day, supposedly so kids develop online meeting skills, etc. They don't seem to have any thought about how lower income parents will be able to afford daycare to go back to work.

[Opti]

May 10, 2021 18:42:36 GMT -5 dannylion said:

It's probably not surprising that restaurants and retail establishments are having trouble hiring.  In addition to low pay and minimal or no benefits in many of those jobs, they all involve a high degree of interaction with the public.  That interaction often involves reminding the public of rules or mandates regarding masks, social distancing, building capacity, and other issues related to the pandemic, etc. 


What we have learned from the public's compliance with and reaction to restrictions during the pandemic is that the public in many places is basically a collection of angry morons with the manners, emotional maturity, and self control of feral toddlers.  They choose to mistake inconvenience for persecution and take out their perceived grievances on those they consider to be low-status people, which often means that restaurant and retail workers are not only facing health risks from possible coronavirus infections from unvaccinated angry morons but also actual physical peril from enraged angry morons, some of whom turn to violence. 


It is likely no wonder that people are not rushing to take advantage of those jobs under the current circumstances.  

One worker got punched in the face at a Wendy's trying to break up a fight. 

[nidena]

This is an interesting story about malls.  

There's, roughly, 25 sq ft for each shopper in 2016.  That's a lot of landscape to ensure has employees, too.  And stores were already understaffed in 2019.

[Tiny]

There's lots of "We're Hiring" signs at my local "fast food" places and what I think are probably "minimum wage" type jobs.

But, If you think about some of the "complaints" of minimum wage jobs:
no standard work week - you get the hours your boss gives you too bad if you don't want to work the evening shift a couple weeknights and then work all weekend - and NOT get in a full 40 hour work week (or what eve is considered full time these days).
too bad if you need to have a day off - you don't get paid.
too bad if you give your boss a heads up that you can't work on X day in the near future and you get scheduled to work on X day.
too bad if you are NOT scheduled to work - but the boss calls and TELLS you have to come and work.

I'd probably avoid going back to that shit as long as was possible. 

And didn't the special unemployment benefits end a long time ago?  For that first wave of 'mass layoffs"?   Did people get the extra unemployment money for 12 months?   

How does that work?    Wouldn't someone collecting unemployment benefits now - have been let go from their job or fired?  within the last 3 months?   Or have they been collecting since last April?    

And in my area - even though it wasn't "officially" open - pretty much since November 2020 - it's be "who cares if people die - we're eating out/drinking, whatever the f&$K we want to do" and local businesses and chains complied.   

Oddly enough - none of the places with "we're hiring signs" have cut back hours or quality or anything else.     Are they just looking to have lots of people to work 4 hours shifts for a total of 26 hours a week (or whatever minimum or maximum is most beneficial to the employers payroll) - instead of just a few people working 8 hours per shift for 40 hours a week... is there some benefit to employers to NOT have people working "full time"

[wvugurl26]

I would also guess some people in retail/food service jobs prior to COVID have made permanent career changes. While those tips they were making were good for many, I assuming some may have changed to what they view as more stable jobs. They have bills to pay, kids to support and the shut down took that away.

I don't think it's all unemployment. I think some people have decided maybe that office job isn't so bad after all. Maybe they'd rather not be so exposed to so many people. Maybe they'd prefer set hours. Many of the people in my office are still waiting for shot #2. Then it's two weeks after that for the best immunity. I assume others are in a similar situation so that could be another reason why they aren't seeing many applicants.

[nidena]

May 10, 2021 19:17:35 GMT -5 Tiny said:

There's lots of "We're Hiring" signs at my local "fast food" places and what I think are probably "minimum wage" type jobs.

If you think about some of the "complaints" of minimum wage jobs:
no standard work week - you get the hours your boss gives you too bad if you don't want to work the evening shift a couple weeknights and then work all weekend - and NOT get in a full 40 hour work week (or what eve is considered full time these days).
too bad if you need to have a day off - you don't get paid.
too bad if you give your boss a heads up that you can't work on X day in the near future and you get scheduled to work on X day.

otoo obad if you are scheduled to work - but the boss calls and TELLS you have to come and work.

All that^

I've also heard that many have to have "open availability" which makes it impossible for them to get another job.  When I was at VS, we had "on call" shifts.  You had to call two hours before your scheduled time to see if you were needed.  They don't do that any longer.

[Deleted]

So, IMO, we have or are on the verge of a real problem. I read the other thread, starting where billisonboard provided the link, and realized I’d actually already read a few of those pages. 

I remember when I worked in operations for a bank decades ago. Working in operations meant I worked in a building separate from the branches and didn't have to deal with the public. I learned that new bank tellers made even less money than I did, had a stricter dress code (that costs money if you don’t already walk around in normal life in “business” clothes) and risked every day, having a gun shoved in their face during their work day, if somebody decided to rob their branch. Which wasn’t exactly uncommon even back then. Never mind the responsibility of handling so many cash transactions, many of them involving large amounts of cash.

I didn’t make much money, and they made even LESS?! I couldn’t make that make sense even back then. When I looked for different jobs within the company, being a bank teller was not even an option I would consider, and I honestly didn’t have a lot going for me IRT having knowledge or skills conducive to landing a “good” job. 

I’ve worked with the public before, and if you never have, let me tell you, it’s “more than a notion” in the best of times, because people be crazy. During a pandemic, I can’t imagine. If that was my only kind of job experience and I couldn’t find a job where I’d be appropriately compensated for dealing with the public (whatever I figured out that meant to me), I’d probably be more inclined to figure out how I could become an entrepreneur, rather than risk my and my loved ones health and lives every day for peanuts while I help pad the pockets of people that can choose to keep themselves safe by working from home. If that meant I depended on unemployment until I figured out how to make my plan together, so be it.

[nidena]

I came across one guy who was adamant that convenience store cashiers shouldn't be paid $15/hr.  He said similar about retail and "burger flippers" and all I could think was "You've never worked those jobs or you'd NEVER say that."  Retail and food service employees see the most entitled of our country.  Ugh!  Just had flashbacks to picking up the pile of discarded try-ons in the fitting room and discovered that one of the garments was the woman's own crusty panties that she had ever so nicely traded with one of ours...and left the store.

[Lizard Queen]

I worked the hardest when I made the least. And all my early jobs worked with the public, and they all sucked.
Yeah, and bank tellers make surprisingly crappy pay.

[billisonboard]

May 10, 2021 19:41:01 GMT -5 nidena said:

I came across one guy who was adamant that convenience store cashiers shouldn't be paid $15/hr.  He said similar about retail and "burger flippers" and all I could think was "You've never worked those jobs or you'd NEVER say that."  Retail and food service employees see the most entitled of our country.  Ugh!  Just had flashbacks to picking up the pile of discarded try-ons in the fitting room and discovered that one of the garments was the woman's own crusty panties that she had ever so nicely traded with one of ours...and left the store.

It is going to become not so much what they "should" be paid and more what do business owners "have" to pay to get someone to take and keep the job.

[Deleted]

Like others I have been reading articles and comments about this.  I am actually enjoying seeing low skill labor getting some recognition and maybe an inadvertent raise out of the pandemic.  Even if it causes some inflation, wage increases were long over due.

As I wrote in the vaccine thread, Amazon and construction, seemed to have taken most of the low skill employees.  Amazon went from basically no employees to the number 4 employer in the area, starting at $15 an hour with benefits.  

Now fast food is starting at $12 an hour.  I see the now hiring signs everywhere, even the cash register at my grocery store or when I place an online order.  I have never seen anything like it.  

I am not sure, the unemployment benefits are driving the shortage.  I know my daughter isn't collecting unemployment, but is just starting to look for a new job after being laid off back in the fall.  She is a student, didn't need the money, and didn't want to pick up covid for minimum wage.  

[jerseygirl]

Two of our local bank branches ( major banks) still only have atm available. Not enough bank tellers . We got call saying one would open in May, didn’t. Went to next town and learned not enough tellers to open, maybe in June?

[nidena]

Ignore the political part of this.  It's a Top 50 for cities with the most fast food restaurants per 100,000 residents.  Check out #1.  Mind you, there's ~150,000 people in that particular city.

www.cbsnews.com/pictures/fast-food-capitals-of-us-america-ranked/

In any case, that's a lot of fast food restaurants looking for employees.  It would not be a bad thing if many of these national chains contracted just bit.

[teen persuasion]

At least for families with young kids - do the math. How much extra do you net from the second income, after subtracting childcare, higher bracket taxes, phasing out of tax credits, transportation costs, convenience meals (vs cooking at home)...?

I figured out a long time ago that I could get our net income/expenses better by being a SAHM while the kids were little. No childcare plus low taxes plus eligible for refundable tax credits. The child tax credits are much larger RN, and childcare has gotten ridiculously expensive.

I think it took the pandemic to force people off the hamster wheel (either layoffs or lack of childcare/in-person school) by necessity. Then they had time to rework the budget, and briefly had nowhere to spend money last year, and *paradigm shift* - frugal living looked pretty good compared to the hamster wheel. Throw in some stimulus money and student loan payments on pause, even better, at least for the time being.


And then there's those of us already saving towards early retirement, and the big market run-up has helped slide us past the finish line. So DH's retiring. He just announced it. His aide is now considering calling it quits (she's 70!), and quite a few young coworkers are picking his brain on how they can replicate our method.

So, no, given the choice, people don't really want to work.

[wvugurl26]

May 10, 2021 21:18:38 GMT -5 nidena said:

Ignore the political part of this.  It's a Top 50 for cities with the most fast food restaurants per 100,000 residents.  Check out #1.  Mind you, there's ~150,000 people in that particular city.

www.cbsnews.com/pictures/fast-food-capitals-of-us-america-ranked/

In any case, that's a lot of fast food restaurants looking for employees.  It would not be a bad thing if many of these national chains contracted just bit.

Number five doesn't even have 100,000 people. And only 30,000 permanent residents.

Some of the chains may close. Maybe some will consider other options to attract employees like a set shift.

[Deleted]

My generation give millennials a lot of grief and look down on them because they have some very different ideas about working. I’m not so sure they have it wrong.

A lot of them prefer to use technology to make money without having a “normal” job. Others aren’t keen on the idea of spending decades working hard and making a job a priority when employers make it very clear that that they don’t really value them, they’d be just fine with or without them. So they spend enough time at one job, to find a better opportunity elsewhere, and rinse and repeat until they get to where they want to be, instead of sticking with one employer for decades.

How employers treat employees has changed imo, and the generations after mine see jobs and careers differently than mine did when we were their ages. A lot of them aren’t interested in working more and harder for less pay and benefits, which is what many employers want employees to do these days. I can’t say that I really blame the people that say no thanks.

[Tiny]

May 10, 2021 19:52:49 GMT -5 Lizard Queen said:

I worked the hardest when I made the least. And all my early jobs worked with the public, and they all sucked.
Yeah, and bank tellers make surprisingly crappy pay.

Just talking to the point of Bank Tellers (and no evening hours).    Not really commenting to Lizard Queen:

I'm guessing the only perk to being a bank teller would be the set daily hours M thru Sat.  At least you won't have to "close" the store at midnight.  And no business hours on Sundays.    

I stuck with a job (4 years) without a raise - at a local mom and pop bakery in HS and then thru Jr. College.   It closed at 6pm M-F and 5pm on Saturdays.   I could work 20 hours or more per week and still have social life and a "day off" every week.   (I was lured away to the "higher pay" and raises at a local "chain store" - but I made it only a month... working weeknight's til 11pm and then having to work the late shift on Saturday and Sunday was hellish and I decided it wasn't worth the few extra $$ I was earning per paycheck.   I went back to my "crappy" job at the bakery and was much happier.  Not having to work nights was worth it.  

[Tiny]

May 10, 2021 21:18:38 GMT -5 nidena said:

Ignore the political part of this.  It's a Top 50 for cities with the most fast food restaurants per 100,000 residents.  Check out #1.  Mind you, there's ~150,000 people in that particular city.

www.cbsnews.com/pictures/fast-food-capitals-of-us-america-ranked/

In any case, that's a lot of fast food restaurants looking for employees.  It would not be a bad thing if many of these national chains contracted just bit.

It's funny to me that how much Americans eat out got brought up.   

Pre covid I was thinking the next "recession" would be driven by restaurants closing their doors.   I was thinking that as other expenses went up - Americans would realize that eating out was eating up alot of their income... and would cut back so they could afford other more important things.  Wages weren't going up... something has to give.

But then the Pandemic hit - and I thought - wow now restaurants really will go under.  But that doesn't seem to have happened. Apparently eating out is a need and not a want in America.    

But, I am wondering how many people/families have discovered how much "extra" money they have due to NOT eating out 5 to 7 meals a week. (I think that was the last "the average American eats out 5 to 7 meals per week that I read.)    I'm guessing a family of 4 is spending about $100 or more per week on take out/restuarant food - probably more.