8 ms·

Why is the real estate market "the real story"? Seems like the real story is that facebook ought to pay its cafeteria workers more.

henraldp 9y ago
Don't be so susceptible. The literal story is about food workers who can't afford to raise a family in Palo Alto. The intended message seems to be that Facebook should pay food workers more than $20/hr. I think it's acceptable for people to ponder outside of that claim.
- frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
  I think people are pondering outside of that claim because young programmers in Palo Alto also want cheap real estate so there's a shared interest. But things this article brings up that are more uncomfortable for the members of this board to think about like paying service workers more or pondering this: “They look at us like we’re lower, like we don’t matter,” said Nicole of the Facebook employees. “We don’t live the dream. The techies are living the dream. It’s for them.” The smaller indignities are numerous. At the end of every shift, Nicole watches large amounts of leftover food go into the compost – food that she’s not allowed to take home. Cafeteria workers only enter Facebook’s medical clinics if they’ve been selected for a mandatory drug test. Facebook recently held a “Bring your kids to work” day, but cafeteria workers’ children were not allowed. are going to go untalked about. And what's the problem with saying that Facebook should pay it's workers more than $20/hr? If it's not enough to live on, that's kind of all there is to it isn't there?
  - RHSeeger 9y ago
    The fact that its not enough to live on combines two things, to varying amounts - The prices of their needs are high enough that they can't afford them (given the amount they make) - The amount they make is low enough that they can't afford their needs Its reasonable to attack both issues, not just the one.
  - Bartweiss 9y ago
    > At the end of every shift, Nicole watches large amounts of leftover food go into the compost – food that she’s not allowed to take home. On that one in particular - is there a law against that? I know rules on food service workers taking things home vary quite a bit.
    - likpok 9y ago
      I've heard that restaurants will spoil food at the end of the day rather than give it to employees to prevent employees from deliberately over-making or mis-making food so they can take it home.
    - goatforce5 9y ago
      I knew someone who worked at a supermarket many years ago when they were in college. Apparently staff were allowed to take home products that were damaged (crumpled/torn packaging, etc.), rather than just throwing them in the trash. Apparently chocolate cookies had an unfortunate and inexplicable habit of being crushed under other products and being deemed unfit for sale. Once the policy changed and staff had to throw damaged products in the garbage compactor, apparently a lot less chocolate cookies were getting damaged.
      - graphitezepp 9y ago
        People using policies in abusive unintended ways, this, is why we cant have nice things.
      - humanrebar 9y ago
        In a low-margin business, it make sense to pay attention to "loss control" but one of the main benefits of keeping food workers on campus is the productivity gains by the "core business" staff. That is to say, a take-home box of food a day shouldn't be a problem on financial grounds, so rules like this are more of a power of ethics issue. In abstract. However, in most cases (I don't know about facebook in particular) food service workers are contractors, and I'm sure the economics don't sort themselves out that way. Anyway, facebook leadership could discourage this sort of nitpicky loss control.
  - FussyZeus 9y ago
    At some point we have to recognize that service workers must be paid a living wage, or be automated. We cannot, morally or economically, have an entire class of worker that we utterly depend on that lives permanently below the poverty line and we just step on them because "they didn't work hard in school" or whichever narrative you prefer to go with for why people who don't have a degree do work that is essential to our civilization. The reality is that the fair market isn't perfect, and even jobs that are low on the totem pole but essential must be compensated in such a way where people don't need to work 60 hour weeks to barely afford a shithole home and car.
    - manigandham 9y ago
      > or be automated That's an extreme opposite from living wage.
      - FussyZeus 9y ago
        Well if you follow the popular theories, this means better jobs are created elsewhere and improve life etc. etc. Historically this is true, this time is a lot different, in general it's just a different discussion I didn't feel like broaching in this thread.
      - sokoloff 9y ago
        If that solution ends up being cheaper, it's likely to be the solution that gets implemented. (That might be OK, provided the now displaced workers choose to move someplace with a lower cost of living where they are able to make ends meet being paid an amount commensurate with the value they create.)
    - purple-again 9y ago
      You need to seriously think through every level of what you are suggesting. You want us to revamp the way we handle the complex interactions of individual autonomous groups from one in which your worth is tied to the value you contribute to society (The rapper 50 cent has a lot more money than a brain surgeon because like it or not the value he created for society was much greater than that one surgeons contribution) to one in which you are rewarded simply for existing. Do you truly believe that is a sustainable system without fully automated existence from resource extraction all the way to finished goods ( which we are not even remotely close to achieving)?
  - ZoeZoeBee 9y ago
    They're subcontracted from Flagship Facility Services, not actual Facebook employees
- moogleii 9y ago
  At the very least, I'm a little surprised Facebook isn't offering more subsidized healthcare.
- kamaal 9y ago
  >>The literal story is about food workers who can't afford to raise a family in Palo Alto. Even well paid programmers, managers and other well paid people can't raise a family in Palo Alto. You can't pick the most expensive and costly neighborhood in all of US and use that as a benchmarks for what people should expect from the economy.
bhups 9y ago
If they were to do that, what do you think would happen to the price of the finite/scarce housing supply?
tyingq 9y ago
The workers are employed by Flagship Facility Services. I assume it's fairly common to contract out the operation of your cafeteria, versus managing that in-house. Their wages are mentioned in the article...$19.85/hr and $17.85/hr. It that unusually low for someone working at, say, a table-service chain restaurant in the same area? Edit: Comparison to tipped workers seems apples/oranges. More curious if ~$18/hr is unusually low for a worker in a similar, non-tipped, job in the same area. Like maybe a BBQ restaurant where the service is similar to a cafeteria.
- thrownblown 9y ago
  Actually, yes. California doesn't allow tipped restaurant servers to be paid less than minimum wage like many other states. PA minimum wage is $15(10-12 take home), and you can expect another $15-30/hr cash. So yes, that's not that much. Not a living wage.
  - tyingq 9y ago
    Not all the employees get tips though. Cooks, busboys, host/hostess, etc.
    - lsiebert 9y ago
      Often waiters will pool tips are pooled with kitchen staff, the exception being managers (managers taking tips would be illegal)
      - tyingq 9y ago
        The fair labor standards act limits that basically to front-of-house in the US. "A valid tip pool may not include employees who do not customarily and regularly received tips, such as dishwashers, cooks, chefs, and janitors."
  - brianwawok 9y ago
    So THIS is why California has so many" no waiter, order at window and take food back to table" restaurants. I knew there has to be a reason but couldn't figure it out... Which I guess means this policy is very polar. The waiters that still have a job make more money. The ones that got replaced by a to go window have nothing.
ocschwar 9y ago
Re-read the comment. There's a lot of truth to it: raise their wages, and in a heartbeat, those workers will see their rents rise.
- humanrebar 9y ago
  ...and more development projects will make financial sense, so there will be more investment in housing. Rising rents are a short term problem, but they do provide long-term solutions. Of course, communities in the Bay Area (and elsewhere) can make it less expensive to build affordable, denser housing. That should have similar long term benefits.
  - SilasX 9y ago
    >...and more development projects will make financial sense, so there will be more investment in housing. Not with the current policies that the G/GGP were criticizing! Numerous projects already make sense, in spades, but are being blocked by planning commissions.
  - prostoalex 9y ago
    > and more development projects will make financial sense, so there will be more investment in housing Maybe. The price of land and the price of construction labor reflect the new realities as well.
- frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
  >There's a lot of truth to it: raise their wages, and in a heartbeat, those workers will see their rents rise. This offers a brilliant solution, just in the other direction. Let's lower the wages of programmers in the area. As their wages decrease the price of real estate will go down!
  - Johnny555 9y ago
    That's true, housing prices will go down as techies move to other areas with better wages like Seattle, Austin, Boston, etc. But then the low paid techie cafeteria workers will be out of a job. So I'm not sure that's a net win.
tmh79 9y ago
Rents are rising at 5-10% a year in the south bay, and if you don't live in mountain view you don't have renters protections. There is no end in sight for cost of living stabilization for the bottom end of the market without large supply growth and/or rent control policies being enacted. Facebook could solve the problem this year by issuing a broad based 10% raise for all of their contract workers, but they would need to do the same thing next year, and the year after that etc etc etc. At the end of the day, all of this money takes a winding route through the valley and ends up in the pockets of people who own land, which is the most scare resource out here. Due to the land use policies of the SFBA (huge swaths of Single family zoning), land itself has become a proxy for access to opportunity, and the land value is derived from both its scarcity and its proximity to high paying jobs. Single family zoning in essence creates a minimum amount of land you need to occupy through rents or investment to have access to the opportunity in the area. While we cannot create more land, we can minimize the amount of land one must occupy to have access to opportunity through up-zoning single family districts to multi family districts (more families occupying the same plot of land in multi family housing compared to single family housing). If we want more people to have more access, then we need to reduce the amount of land they must occupy for that access, through sensible land use reforms. As far as I know, there is no other solution (other than full communism) that does not involve the equivalent of vast subsidies to existing land owners
- sologoub 9y ago
  You can also invest in improving public transit and shoring up what you already have - for example, BART and systems like it could be used to link areas more effectively/reliably. In talking with some friends in the Bay Area, all feel that East Bay is just too risky with problems BART has been facing in reliability, but all love the less congested feel of say Moraga or Walnut Creek. The article focuses on the fact that the family cannot afford Menlo Park. There are surrounding communities that would allow them at least a 2br for what they earn, yet I suspect they cannot do this because of commute difficulties and schools for kids. Both parents can't really be expected to endure 2 hour commutes, as things come up with kids and you need to be there for them quickly. Schools deserve a separate discussion though. Menlo Park is great and super expensive, but I don't think it's fair to demand that everyone be able to afford it. I can't and that's ok with me. However, the cost of not being able to afford it should not be not seeing your kids grow up. That's a solvable problem and not a class struggle.
qudat 9y ago
Why should they be paid more? If someone is willing to work for that wage then that is what the wage will be set at.
- Broken_Hippo 9y ago
  "willing to work" This pretends there is actual choice for most folks, when the truth is most folks are just choosing between jobs that pay around the same. The alternative is to not have food, shelter, and such things. That is hardly a choice - of course folks will be willing to work for that amount. Theoretically one can go to college or work their way up, but all those take time. College takes money. I don't know where one is supposed to get that without taking such jobs in the meantime, nor how one is supposed to afford it if they can't afford basic things. Promotion? good luck.
  - Melchizedek 9y ago
    Student loans?
    - lovich 9y ago
      Which are becoming less and less worth it everyday as other forces extract all the value out of them with higher rates? It's a problem along every facet of society currently, all of the value is being extracted to an increasing few
    - Broken_Hippo 9y ago
      They generally won't cover housing and food costs to make up for the lost wages while going to school, especially if you have a family to feed. One might make it working part-time so long as you have a spouse to help you out. But hey, folks get lucky. Others don't, though, and still wind up paying for some books and fees on top of taking out loans. Not to mention buying things like a current computer, making sure to have internet access (lets face it, with a job, kids, and school, you probably aren't making it to the library), and so on. Afterwards, you'll need to pay that student loan back. You get 6 months before you start paying it back. You might not even find a decent job at all. There are income-based payment plans. They require not falling behind on your loans most times, and even if they don't the private company collecting might make you think that way. If you can't pay and stupid things happen, they'll garnish your wages. 25% (ish), but they'll make sure to leave you a salary equal to 30 hours work at minimum wage. They'll take your tax returns too. And as an odd fact: It really ins't possible to take out loans for part-time schooling if you want to get a bachelors degree: Federal student loan funding stops after 6 years, at which point you must pay off the first year's loan to get another year. (I think full time does 5 years). You might be able to get an associates or professional certificate at the local community college, though, if you are lucky enough to have one in your area (many do not). I know this isn't everyone's story, but this stuff is common enough to consider as a risk factor. It might have been a way to financial stability at one time, but it isn't such a sure thing anymore.
turc1656 9y ago
Did you read the article? They don't work for Facebook. They work for a contractor that Facebook uses to supply food service to employees.

henraldp 9y ago

Don't be so susceptible. The literal story is about food workers who can't afford to raise a family in Palo Alto. The intended message seems to be that Facebook should pay food workers more than $20/hr. I think it's acceptable for people to ponder outside of that claim.

frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
I think people are pondering outside of that claim because young programmers in Palo Alto also want cheap real estate so there's a shared interest. But things this article brings up that are more uncomfortable for the members of this board to think about like paying service workers more or pondering this: “They look at us like we’re lower, like we don’t matter,” said Nicole of the Facebook employees. “We don’t live the dream. The techies are living the dream. It’s for them.” The smaller indignities are numerous. At the end of every shift, Nicole watches large amounts of leftover food go into the compost – food that she’s not allowed to take home. Cafeteria workers only enter Facebook’s medical clinics if they’ve been selected for a mandatory drug test. Facebook recently held a “Bring your kids to work” day, but cafeteria workers’ children were not allowed. are going to go untalked about. And what's the problem with saying that Facebook should pay it's workers more than $20/hr? If it's not enough to live on, that's kind of all there is to it isn't there?
- RHSeeger 9y ago
  The fact that its not enough to live on combines two things, to varying amounts - The prices of their needs are high enough that they can't afford them (given the amount they make) - The amount they make is low enough that they can't afford their needs Its reasonable to attack both issues, not just the one.
- Bartweiss 9y ago
  > At the end of every shift, Nicole watches large amounts of leftover food go into the compost – food that she’s not allowed to take home. On that one in particular - is there a law against that? I know rules on food service workers taking things home vary quite a bit.
  - likpok 9y ago
    I've heard that restaurants will spoil food at the end of the day rather than give it to employees to prevent employees from deliberately over-making or mis-making food so they can take it home.
  - goatforce5 9y ago
    I knew someone who worked at a supermarket many years ago when they were in college. Apparently staff were allowed to take home products that were damaged (crumpled/torn packaging, etc.), rather than just throwing them in the trash. Apparently chocolate cookies had an unfortunate and inexplicable habit of being crushed under other products and being deemed unfit for sale. Once the policy changed and staff had to throw damaged products in the garbage compactor, apparently a lot less chocolate cookies were getting damaged.
    - graphitezepp 9y ago
      People using policies in abusive unintended ways, this, is why we cant have nice things.
    - humanrebar 9y ago
      In a low-margin business, it make sense to pay attention to "loss control" but one of the main benefits of keeping food workers on campus is the productivity gains by the "core business" staff. That is to say, a take-home box of food a day shouldn't be a problem on financial grounds, so rules like this are more of a power of ethics issue. In abstract. However, in most cases (I don't know about facebook in particular) food service workers are contractors, and I'm sure the economics don't sort themselves out that way. Anyway, facebook leadership could discourage this sort of nitpicky loss control.
- FussyZeus 9y ago
  At some point we have to recognize that service workers must be paid a living wage, or be automated. We cannot, morally or economically, have an entire class of worker that we utterly depend on that lives permanently below the poverty line and we just step on them because "they didn't work hard in school" or whichever narrative you prefer to go with for why people who don't have a degree do work that is essential to our civilization. The reality is that the fair market isn't perfect, and even jobs that are low on the totem pole but essential must be compensated in such a way where people don't need to work 60 hour weeks to barely afford a shithole home and car.
  - manigandham 9y ago
    > or be automated That's an extreme opposite from living wage.
    - FussyZeus 9y ago
      Well if you follow the popular theories, this means better jobs are created elsewhere and improve life etc. etc. Historically this is true, this time is a lot different, in general it's just a different discussion I didn't feel like broaching in this thread.
    - sokoloff 9y ago
      If that solution ends up being cheaper, it's likely to be the solution that gets implemented. (That might be OK, provided the now displaced workers choose to move someplace with a lower cost of living where they are able to make ends meet being paid an amount commensurate with the value they create.)
  - purple-again 9y ago
    You need to seriously think through every level of what you are suggesting. You want us to revamp the way we handle the complex interactions of individual autonomous groups from one in which your worth is tied to the value you contribute to society (The rapper 50 cent has a lot more money than a brain surgeon because like it or not the value he created for society was much greater than that one surgeons contribution) to one in which you are rewarded simply for existing. Do you truly believe that is a sustainable system without fully automated existence from resource extraction all the way to finished goods ( which we are not even remotely close to achieving)?
- ZoeZoeBee 9y ago
  They're subcontracted from Flagship Facility Services, not actual Facebook employees
moogleii 9y ago
At the very least, I'm a little surprised Facebook isn't offering more subsidized healthcare.
kamaal 9y ago
>>The literal story is about food workers who can't afford to raise a family in Palo Alto. Even well paid programmers, managers and other well paid people can't raise a family in Palo Alto. You can't pick the most expensive and costly neighborhood in all of US and use that as a benchmarks for what people should expect from the economy.

bhups 9y ago

If they were to do that, what do you think would happen to the price of the finite/scarce housing supply?

tyingq 9y ago

The workers are employed by Flagship Facility Services. I assume it's fairly common to contract out the operation of your cafeteria, versus managing that in-house. Their wages are mentioned in the article...$19.85/hr and $17.85/hr. It that unusually low for someone working at, say, a table-service chain restaurant in the same area? Edit: Comparison to tipped workers seems apples/oranges. More curious if ~$18/hr is unusually low for a worker in a similar, non-tipped, job in the same area. Like maybe a BBQ restaurant where the service is similar to a cafeteria.

thrownblown 9y ago
Actually, yes. California doesn't allow tipped restaurant servers to be paid less than minimum wage like many other states. PA minimum wage is $15(10-12 take home), and you can expect another $15-30/hr cash. So yes, that's not that much. Not a living wage.
- tyingq 9y ago
  Not all the employees get tips though. Cooks, busboys, host/hostess, etc.
  - lsiebert 9y ago
    Often waiters will pool tips are pooled with kitchen staff, the exception being managers (managers taking tips would be illegal)
    - tyingq 9y ago
      The fair labor standards act limits that basically to front-of-house in the US. "A valid tip pool may not include employees who do not customarily and regularly received tips, such as dishwashers, cooks, chefs, and janitors."
- brianwawok 9y ago
  So THIS is why California has so many" no waiter, order at window and take food back to table" restaurants. I knew there has to be a reason but couldn't figure it out... Which I guess means this policy is very polar. The waiters that still have a job make more money. The ones that got replaced by a to go window have nothing.

ocschwar 9y ago

Re-read the comment. There's a lot of truth to it: raise their wages, and in a heartbeat, those workers will see their rents rise.

humanrebar 9y ago
...and more development projects will make financial sense, so there will be more investment in housing. Rising rents are a short term problem, but they do provide long-term solutions. Of course, communities in the Bay Area (and elsewhere) can make it less expensive to build affordable, denser housing. That should have similar long term benefits.
- SilasX 9y ago
  >...and more development projects will make financial sense, so there will be more investment in housing. Not with the current policies that the G/GGP were criticizing! Numerous projects already make sense, in spades, but are being blocked by planning commissions.
- prostoalex 9y ago
  > and more development projects will make financial sense, so there will be more investment in housing Maybe. The price of land and the price of construction labor reflect the new realities as well.
frgtpsswrdlame 9y ago
>There's a lot of truth to it: raise their wages, and in a heartbeat, those workers will see their rents rise. This offers a brilliant solution, just in the other direction. Let's lower the wages of programmers in the area. As their wages decrease the price of real estate will go down!
- Johnny555 9y ago
  That's true, housing prices will go down as techies move to other areas with better wages like Seattle, Austin, Boston, etc. But then the low paid techie cafeteria workers will be out of a job. So I'm not sure that's a net win.

tmh79 9y ago

Rents are rising at 5-10% a year in the south bay, and if you don't live in mountain view you don't have renters protections. There is no end in sight for cost of living stabilization for the bottom end of the market without large supply growth and/or rent control policies being enacted. Facebook could solve the problem this year by issuing a broad based 10% raise for all of their contract workers, but they would need to do the same thing next year, and the year after that etc etc etc. At the end of the day, all of this money takes a winding route through the valley and ends up in the pockets of people who own land, which is the most scare resource out here. Due to the land use policies of the SFBA (huge swaths of Single family zoning), land itself has become a proxy for access to opportunity, and the land value is derived from both its scarcity and its proximity to high paying jobs. Single family zoning in essence creates a minimum amount of land you need to occupy through rents or investment to have access to the opportunity in the area. While we cannot create more land, we can minimize the amount of land one must occupy to have access to opportunity through up-zoning single family districts to multi family districts (more families occupying the same plot of land in multi family housing compared to single family housing). If we want more people to have more access, then we need to reduce the amount of land they must occupy for that access, through sensible land use reforms. As far as I know, there is no other solution (other than full communism) that does not involve the equivalent of vast subsidies to existing land owners

sologoub 9y ago
You can also invest in improving public transit and shoring up what you already have - for example, BART and systems like it could be used to link areas more effectively/reliably. In talking with some friends in the Bay Area, all feel that East Bay is just too risky with problems BART has been facing in reliability, but all love the less congested feel of say Moraga or Walnut Creek. The article focuses on the fact that the family cannot afford Menlo Park. There are surrounding communities that would allow them at least a 2br for what they earn, yet I suspect they cannot do this because of commute difficulties and schools for kids. Both parents can't really be expected to endure 2 hour commutes, as things come up with kids and you need to be there for them quickly. Schools deserve a separate discussion though. Menlo Park is great and super expensive, but I don't think it's fair to demand that everyone be able to afford it. I can't and that's ok with me. However, the cost of not being able to afford it should not be not seeing your kids grow up. That's a solvable problem and not a class struggle.

qudat 9y ago

Why should they be paid more? If someone is willing to work for that wage then that is what the wage will be set at.

Broken_Hippo 9y ago
"willing to work" This pretends there is actual choice for most folks, when the truth is most folks are just choosing between jobs that pay around the same. The alternative is to not have food, shelter, and such things. That is hardly a choice - of course folks will be willing to work for that amount. Theoretically one can go to college or work their way up, but all those take time. College takes money. I don't know where one is supposed to get that without taking such jobs in the meantime, nor how one is supposed to afford it if they can't afford basic things. Promotion? good luck.
- Melchizedek 9y ago
  Student loans?
  - lovich 9y ago
    Which are becoming less and less worth it everyday as other forces extract all the value out of them with higher rates? It's a problem along every facet of society currently, all of the value is being extracted to an increasing few
  - Broken_Hippo 9y ago
    They generally won't cover housing and food costs to make up for the lost wages while going to school, especially if you have a family to feed. One might make it working part-time so long as you have a spouse to help you out. But hey, folks get lucky. Others don't, though, and still wind up paying for some books and fees on top of taking out loans. Not to mention buying things like a current computer, making sure to have internet access (lets face it, with a job, kids, and school, you probably aren't making it to the library), and so on. Afterwards, you'll need to pay that student loan back. You get 6 months before you start paying it back. You might not even find a decent job at all. There are income-based payment plans. They require not falling behind on your loans most times, and even if they don't the private company collecting might make you think that way. If you can't pay and stupid things happen, they'll garnish your wages. 25% (ish), but they'll make sure to leave you a salary equal to 30 hours work at minimum wage. They'll take your tax returns too. And as an odd fact: It really ins't possible to take out loans for part-time schooling if you want to get a bachelors degree: Federal student loan funding stops after 6 years, at which point you must pay off the first year's loan to get another year. (I think full time does 5 years). You might be able to get an associates or professional certificate at the local community college, though, if you are lucky enough to have one in your area (many do not). I know this isn't everyone's story, but this stuff is common enough to consider as a risk factor. It might have been a way to financial stability at one time, but it isn't such a sure thing anymore.

turc1656 9y ago

Did you read the article? They don't work for Facebook. They work for a contractor that Facebook uses to supply food service to employees.