5 ms·

Recently heard someone argue "If you can't afford to pay livable wages, then you can't afford to be in business". Have to say I agree with that. It's hard for m

Recently heard someone argue "If you can't afford to pay livable wages, then you can't afford to be in business". Have to say I agree with that. It's hard for me to feel sorry for businesses who rely on importing cheap labor to survive.

soldierofhayley 9y ago
The other thing is these business offload their costs onto the rest of us. While they enjoy using their illegal immigrant labor, the rest of the taxpayers and I have to pay for their schools, medical expenses, criminal costs, and all the other negative externalities they impose on us. This and islamic extremism will be what destroys the left in this country.
rfrank 9y ago
What percentage of companies in SV pay their customer support staff a 'livable wage' for the bay area? If I recall correctly, this community wasn't kind to the Yelp letter girl.
- CaptSpify 9y ago
  yelp letter girl?
  - rfrank 9y ago
    https://medium.com/@taliajane/an-open-letter-to-my-ceo-fb73df021e7a https://medium.com/@taliajane/an-open-letter-to-my-ceo-fb73d... edit: hn thread from the time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11138086 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11138086
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- a3n 9y ago
  And I'll bet the office and engineering staff at Uber, for example, absolutely love their drivers who have to work long days to barely break even-plus, many of whom sleep in airport parking lots and similar while they're away from home, working where the money is. Sure, they have a "choice," they don't have to drive 250 miles and stay at their jobs for a week for low pay. But sleeping in your car to be able to work is, as the say, "not normal." The only reason Uber is able to get away with this is because their drivers' choices are limited. Just like the Jamaicans and similar that come to America to pick and serve strawberries. They're exploited because it's possible. It's a dilemna, I realize. I rarely go stay at a B&B, for example, and if the B&B paid "American, livable" wages, they'd be too expensive for me to ever go. So maybe a business that provides "services" for things like a place to sleep (and someone to clean up after you) and something to eat (and someone to cook and clean up after you) is simply not sustainable (even though those exploited people would probably rather have the job than not). Maybe there shouldn't be lots of hotels, restaurants and car services, except for the niche that serve people willing and able to pay enough for those services to in turn pay equitable wages. Pretty tough to figure out, for me.
  - astrange 9y ago
    The question you're missing is - why does a livable wage have to be so high? (It's because capitalists have stolen all the property and are renting it back to you.)
  - sjg007 9y ago
    The B&B thing was solved by AirBnB.
kelnos 9y ago
I'm sure you'd also be totally ok with the _much_ higher prices this would cause?
- HarryHirsch 9y ago
  The greater part of operating cost isn't wages, it's rent for the premises, cost of energy and of raw materials, and yet this pernicious meme gets trotted out every damn time the subject of minimum wage comes up. What I cannot understand is why that is.
  - pm24601 9y ago
    I understand why: It serves the interest of CEOs What I don't understand is why non-CEOs believe it so dogmatically.
  - palakchokshi 9y ago
    Maybe because people subconsciously equate the % rise in wage to % rise in out of pocket expense e.g. if wages increase $4/hour (50% increase) that means the cost to buy that shirt will increase by 50%
  - kelnos 9y ago
    Care to back that up? Every time I read something[1] -- reputable -- about, for example, restaurants testing out eliminating tipping in favor of paying employees a livable wage, they have to implement a mix of cutting staff (and making existing staff work harder), increasing prices (sometimes beyond the 18% you'd expect based on a common tip amount), and reducing quality of ingredients (or finding ways to consolidate menu items to reduce the variety of ingredients or increase scale). [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/dining/restaurants-no-tipping-service.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/dining/restaurants-no-tip...
- e12e 9y ago
  There was a news report[1] that for h&m to pay workers in Asia local living local wage (an additional ~120 USD/week), prices of shirts would go up ~50 cent. Accordingly, if prices went up ~3.50 the workers should make around 40-50k usd/year. Doesn't sound all that terrible. [1] https://www.dn.no/nyheter/2017/06/02/0942/Handel/nordea-sjef-sa-mye-mer-ville-en-hampm-skjorte-koste-hvis-de-som-syr-fikk-en-levelig-lonn https://www.dn.no/nyheter/2017/06/02/0942/Handel/nordea-sjef... (Norwegian, statement by head of the Nordea bank)
sjg007 9y ago
The wages are livable for the temporary foreign workers who came in seasonally. This was standard operating procedure. These towns are tourist towns. So now you have whole local economies shutting down because Americans need jobs. Oh the irony.

soldierofhayley 9y ago

The other thing is these business offload their costs onto the rest of us. While they enjoy using their illegal immigrant labor, the rest of the taxpayers and I have to pay for their schools, medical expenses, criminal costs, and all the other negative externalities they impose on us. This and islamic extremism will be what destroys the left in this country.

rfrank 9y ago

What percentage of companies in SV pay their customer support staff a 'livable wage' for the bay area? If I recall correctly, this community wasn't kind to the Yelp letter girl.

CaptSpify 9y ago
yelp letter girl?
- rfrank 9y ago
  https://medium.com/@taliajane/an-open-letter-to-my-ceo-fb73df021e7a https://medium.com/@taliajane/an-open-letter-to-my-ceo-fb73d... edit: hn thread from the time: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11138086 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11138086
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
a3n 9y ago
And I'll bet the office and engineering staff at Uber, for example, absolutely love their drivers who have to work long days to barely break even-plus, many of whom sleep in airport parking lots and similar while they're away from home, working where the money is. Sure, they have a "choice," they don't have to drive 250 miles and stay at their jobs for a week for low pay. But sleeping in your car to be able to work is, as the say, "not normal." The only reason Uber is able to get away with this is because their drivers' choices are limited. Just like the Jamaicans and similar that come to America to pick and serve strawberries. They're exploited because it's possible. It's a dilemna, I realize. I rarely go stay at a B&B, for example, and if the B&B paid "American, livable" wages, they'd be too expensive for me to ever go. So maybe a business that provides "services" for things like a place to sleep (and someone to clean up after you) and something to eat (and someone to cook and clean up after you) is simply not sustainable (even though those exploited people would probably rather have the job than not). Maybe there shouldn't be lots of hotels, restaurants and car services, except for the niche that serve people willing and able to pay enough for those services to in turn pay equitable wages. Pretty tough to figure out, for me.
- astrange 9y ago
  The question you're missing is - why does a livable wage have to be so high? (It's because capitalists have stolen all the property and are renting it back to you.)
- sjg007 9y ago
  The B&B thing was solved by AirBnB.

kelnos 9y ago

I'm sure you'd also be totally ok with the _much_ higher prices this would cause?

HarryHirsch 9y ago
The greater part of operating cost isn't wages, it's rent for the premises, cost of energy and of raw materials, and yet this pernicious meme gets trotted out every damn time the subject of minimum wage comes up. What I cannot understand is why that is.
- pm24601 9y ago
  I understand why: It serves the interest of CEOs What I don't understand is why non-CEOs believe it so dogmatically.
- palakchokshi 9y ago
  Maybe because people subconsciously equate the % rise in wage to % rise in out of pocket expense e.g. if wages increase $4/hour (50% increase) that means the cost to buy that shirt will increase by 50%
- kelnos 9y ago
  Care to back that up? Every time I read something[1] -- reputable -- about, for example, restaurants testing out eliminating tipping in favor of paying employees a livable wage, they have to implement a mix of cutting staff (and making existing staff work harder), increasing prices (sometimes beyond the 18% you'd expect based on a common tip amount), and reducing quality of ingredients (or finding ways to consolidate menu items to reduce the variety of ingredients or increase scale). [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/dining/restaurants-no-tipping-service.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/dining/restaurants-no-tip...
e12e 9y ago
There was a news report[1] that for h&m to pay workers in Asia local living local wage (an additional ~120 USD/week), prices of shirts would go up ~50 cent. Accordingly, if prices went up ~3.50 the workers should make around 40-50k usd/year. Doesn't sound all that terrible. [1] https://www.dn.no/nyheter/2017/06/02/0942/Handel/nordea-sjef-sa-mye-mer-ville-en-hampm-skjorte-koste-hvis-de-som-syr-fikk-en-levelig-lonn https://www.dn.no/nyheter/2017/06/02/0942/Handel/nordea-sjef... (Norwegian, statement by head of the Nordea bank)

sjg007 9y ago

The wages are livable for the temporary foreign workers who came in seasonally. This was standard operating procedure. These towns are tourist towns. So now you have whole local economies shutting down because Americans need jobs. Oh the irony.