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The War Inside 7-Eleven

111 points by robg 8y ago

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
rayiner 8y ago
While there seems like a desire to blame 7-Eleven here, they are completely right to not want to have their franchisees violating federal immigration laws. While they are insulated by the contractor-contractee relationship, the government is humourless about these sorts of things. The violations are easy to prove (either you have proper employment documentation or you don’t) and enforcement is politically popular. That’s a bad combination from a corporate risk management point of view.
- supercanuck 8y ago
  Sounds like immigration is gonna be this generation's "War on Drugs"
  - toomuchtodo 8y ago
    Not a lot of good solutions. Can't let everyone in. No one cares for merit based immigration like other countries (ie Canada) because pro-immigration supporters want others than the best to have a shot, and no one wants quotas because it'll clamp down on immigration from countries with large populations (China and India).
    - esotericn 8y ago
      The US was founded on immigration. > Can't let everyone in. Why not?
      - toomuchtodo 8y ago
        Because it breaks your economy and social fabric (super simplified for the sake of fitting a decent reply into one short HN comment). We're at the lowest level of unemployment in decades, and wages are barely moving up. Bringing in large amounts of unskilled workers (remember, skilled workers get in on merit) would only delay wages rising (or those unskilled workers are going to be working under the table in jobs like slaughter houses, dairy farms, and other hazardous work environments where they will have no recourse when they're injured or maimed). Some immigrants want to integrate with American society, but not all (and that is what is expected of you as an immigrant, to share and hold our values in the same regard citizens do). Europe has had its fair share of troubles with economic migrants. This isn't about race, this is about economic systems and the social stability of your host country. I support an immigration pipeline that gets skilled workers into the US as fast as possible (most especially in the healthcare field), but that's not what's on the public policy table.
        moorhosj 8y ago
        Immigration is at generationally low levels, I don’t see how you could blame it for lack of wage increases. What about the stagnant minimum wage, record corporate profits or union busting; might they play a role? “American society” and “our values” are by-products of immigration, how would more immigrants ruin that?
        toomuchtodo 8y ago
        > What about the stagnant minimum wage, record corporate profits or union busting might they play a role? I don't discount that these are major contributors to the problem. Adding additional labor supply, supply willing to work for almost nothing, does not help the problem.
        moorhosj 8y ago
        Growing the pie has always helped everyone in America. Is there something that has fundamentally changed in your view to alter this trend? Are there Americans out there who want to do these types of jobs?
      - briandear 8y ago
        Imagine if the entire population of Bangladesh were suddenly added to the state of California. You’d quickly become the third world because no country could handle that sort of influx. Just the act of building enough schools would bankrupt the state. Not to mention any other social services — and the only benefit to the country initially would be simply millions of unskilled workers — which would drive wages to near zero. If you enforce minimum wages, then you’d have massive unemployment. Immigration should be fair, measured and designed around a policy of quick assimilation, both for the benefit of the immigrant and the existing citizens.
        mynameisvlad 8y ago
        That's not realistic. Even remotely. There won't be some sudden influx because getting to the United States alone is hard. For most people, it'll be a transoceanic flight which is not very cheap at all.
        int_19h 8y ago
        Speaking as an immigrant - trust me, there would be. Yes, you wouldn't get the entire population of the Third World overnight. But even the amount that could afford it (or would save to afford it if they knew they had that option) would be orders of magnitude more, and would overwhelm the country.
        rayiner 8y ago
        This should not be down voted. I am from Bangladesh. You’re leaving out the fact that your hypothetical would also destroy our social fabric. Fully 1/3 of the population of the country believes that I should be executed for leaving Islam: http://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-beliefs-about-sharia http://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-religi.... That makes Bangladesh very moderate compared to say Pakistan where that number is 2/3.
      - pixl97 8y ago
        Why dont you ask the native Americans about that.
        camgunz 8y ago
        Are you drawing a comparison between what the US did to Native Americans and what immigrants might do to us? That is such a dangerous, slanderous, ignorant comment that I really have to question your motives.
        Aloha 8y ago
        Is it? Our ancestors tried to annihilate natives in almost totality (physically first, then just culturally) - why is it a shock that some Americans would be afraid of the same thing happening to us? I mean one of the hallmarks of American culture is subsuming the culture of the newly arrived into our own - it not unconscionable to think that some Americans think all peoples/cultures have that same impulse. I'm generally pro-immigration, but you need to have immigrants that want to be Americans, not people who want to bring their culture with them and pass it down. That means people who understand freedom of speech, democratic values, and largely either speak, or are willing to learn english.
        rayiner 8y ago
        As an immigrant myself, that is certainly what my family thought they were signing up for when they came here. Indeed, we left Bangladesh precisely because it was turning away from western culture and values. I think, for the most part, immigrants today feel that way too. (There is evidence that Spanish speaking immigrants are taking up English faster than German speaking immigrants did). What scares me are the (I think well meaning but misguided) liberals who deny that assimilation is imperative.
        Aloha 8y ago
        I guess they assume that assimilation is bad, and is causing some cultural havoc - Whereas you and I both feel that assimilation is an imperative, While the newly arrived have historically wanted to do everything they can to be american, some old fashioned and/or non-americas values will always remain for them - they didnt grow up fully immersed in our culture. In any case assimilation is what will happen, with it mostly locked in by the first native born generation, and fully locked in by the second native born generation. I'm glad you and your family are here, adding to our rich tapestry of culture and experiences.
    - dragonwriter 8y ago
      > Not a lot of good solutions. There are a lot of easy improvements; there's no perfect solution, but this is a perfect is the enemy of the good situation. > Can't let everyone in. There are two halves of this: Not everyone is personally acceptable as an immigrant; there are reasons for prohibition based on individual history. You can't let everyone who isn't individually prohibited in for free because assimilating immigrants has costs. The US has a basically reasonable approach (perhaps wanting some tweaks in details) for the first, but less than ideal handling of the second; most notably, aside from issues with the design of some of the available visa categories like H-1B, hard per-category caps and even moreso, per-country caps on visa categories exacerbate supply/demand imbalances for which the natural consequence is illegal migration. > No one cares for merit based immigration like other countries US preference categories, which are the basis of virtually all legal immigration, are merit-based, though you may not like then particular notion of merit on which they are based. > and no one wants quotas We have both per-category, and within each category per-country, quotas, and lots of people want them (and many want them to be smaller.) It's not a good policy, but many people absolutely do.want them. > because it'll clamp down on immigration from countries with large populations (China and India). Well, the particular formula effects countries with large number of people qualified and seeking to immigrate, which depending on the Visa category includes Mexico, the Phillipines, China, and India (and I think a couple others in a few categories.) Population has an indirect role, but it's not the direct driver of quota imbalance.
  - ryandrake 8y ago
    Which generation? This is being planned and executed by the same people that conducted (and failed) the war on drugs.
    - zzzcpan 8y ago
      Why do you think it failed? I imagine failure of the war on drugs would be a revolution. That didn't happen, so the war on drugs didn't fail. War on drugs was never about drugs.
      - ryandrake 8y ago
        Good point. The War on Drugs stated goal of getting rid of an arbitrary subset of drugs and their users failed. The real goal, oppression and mass-incarceration of dark skinned and poor people, was a pretty resounding success. They’ve at least dropped the pretext with the War on Immigrants. The stated goal is the real goal: oppression, deportation and mass-incarceration of (primarily dark skinned and poor) foreigners and immigrants.
        briandear 8y ago
        > War on Immigrants Immigrants and illegal aliens are different. Legal immigrants aren’t getting oppressed, deported without cause or mass incarcerated. The clever wordplay to conflate immigrants with illegal aliens is rather effective because it creates a convienent xenophobic narrative, when the truth is that a majority of Americans are against illegal aliens but for legal immigrants.
        Aloha 8y ago
        It's not really targeting poor people, or dark skinned people - it's targeting people that the elites of the time saw as 'morally deficient' - most malum prohibitum laws target moral perceptions of moral deficiency - or try to preserve notions of a static society.
      - vezycash 8y ago
        Downvoted you initially but changed it to an upvote after reading it three times. Clarification: Iff the war on drugs was designed to systematically imprison Blacks, then the war's been largely successful.
- lvspiff 8y ago
  I agree - it will be interesting to see what happens when other franchisee owned corps catch on - a lot of pizza, hamburger, and other fast food shops are filled with immigrant workers. Then there comes the hotels and casinos, and then things like cleaning companies. All employ large numbers of immigrants that if the govt were to raid could cause issues for. Until the US has a comprehensive immigration plan and a better way to verify legal working status corps will use this law as a way to take back from franchisees.
- crawfordcomeaux 8y ago
  Sounds like corporate risk management is violent and dehumanizing. Maybe it's time for humane strategies for managing human systems?
- mabbo 8y ago
  While I agree with you, I also feel that 7-Eleven Corporate has taken the wrong approach to this. They've made it "me vs you" rather than "us vs the problem". They're pushing the franchisees in aggressive ways to extract more money out of them to start and then hiring a police force to spy on them. Now it sounds like they're sending out ICE against anyone who criticizes them, even those not breaking the law. That's not a healthy relationship. When corporate pushes margins thinner and thinner, only those willing to break laws will be able to survive. Take the money being spent on surveillance vans and ex-cops and instead spend it on incentive systems, on committees of franchisees, of groups designed around "how can we solve this problem?". Stop using a heavy hand and start working with the other side. They're not the enemy here, they're the lifeblood of the company.
  - lostmsu 8y ago
    > Now it sounds like they're sending out ICE against anyone who criticizes them, even those not breaking the law. I guess the article's author were successful in fooling readers. Nowhere in the article does it say that happened ever. Only that rumors about that became widespread (now even more with this article).
    - Latteland 8y ago
      The article strongly suggests that is what is happening though. If 7-11 was really worried about it, they'd send them to every 7-11. They don't want to do that because it would make everyone mad, and I bet they don't do it to the franchises they own.
- notacoward 8y ago
  Selective enforcement even of an just law (or contract clause) is itself unjust. That's what the article's about - not that 7-11 is trying to enforce the rules, but that they are selectively enforcing against certain franchisees, and using taxpayer-funded muscle to do it. Imagine if use of work computers for anything personal was a widely violated rule where you work, but the only people who ever seemed to get busted were the ones who had made complaints to HR, and they brought in the FBI to do it in the most intimidating and humiliating way possible. But hey, they did wrong, so the company's morally right? No.
lotsofpulp 8y ago
Are these claims below true? I was under the impression that a in a franchisor - franchisee relationship, the franchisee owns the business, and they are paying the franchisor to use the brand according to whatever standards are agreed upon. But I've never heard of a franchisor being able to "take over" a business, or do payroll for a franchisee. I've only ever heard of a a franchisee having to stop using the franchisor's name and possibly paying some monetary penalties as defined in the franchising agreement, but what's described below sounds crazy. > Store owners found in violation of immigration law could be in breach of their franchise agreements. And as they well know, 7-Eleven has the contractual right to take back a store from someone who’s violated his or her agreement. >An accumulation of four breaches in two years can give the company cause to terminate an agreement and take over the store. >Store owners are required to deposit all sales receipts into a 7-Eleven bank account. The corporate payroll department in Dallas reviews time sheets for each employee, deducts taxes, and sends workers their pay, sometimes on debit cards that don’t require a bank account. Franchisees’ earnings are deposited in their personal bank accounts.
- berbec 8y ago
  This is totally possible and not out of line with other agreements. I know of one agreement that requires the franchisee to pay corporate's legal fees if a lawsuit resulted from actions in the store.
  - lotsofpulp 8y ago
    I've seen that too, but that's also just monetary penalties. From the agreements I've seen for hotels, there was never any equity involved, and the franchisor definitely didn't want anything to do with payroll. In fact, being shielded from that kind of liability is one of the perks of being a franchisor, so it's very surprising that 7-Eleven would even want to be a part of that. I can see wanting to track sales and whatnot so they can verify that they're getting their cut, but I see no benefit to 7-Eleven corporate to getting involved with the staffing, it's not like their royalties would be effected. And they would get to put all the blame on the franchisee when problems like this occur.
- 8y ago
jnbiche 8y ago
I know there are folks on here who will roll their eyes, but this kind of display is emblematic of a fascist government. Fascism is the bonding of state and corporate power, driven by nationalism, authoritarianism, and a (usually) charismatic leader. For the record, I'm not a radical. I'm not even particularly partisan. I'm an average, middle-class American. But I've read enough history to know which way the wind is blowing in this country. I only hope we can come to our senses before it's truly too late.
- tomschlick 8y ago
  > but this kind of display is emblematic of a fascist government Enforcing immigration law passed by a democratically elected congress is fascist? Really?
  - jnbiche 8y ago
    No, a corporation using a federal law enforcement agency to target owners who were disfavored by the corporation is typical of fascism. I'm not even interested in this fake debate that was stirred up about immigration. Of course we have to have enforced borders. Of course we need immigration laws that will be enforced. What concerns me is the collaboration between corporations and state power, all taking place in an atmosphere of acute nationalism.
    - tomschlick 8y ago
      Would you see it the same way if it were related to taxes? As in, if 7-11 found out certain franchisee's were skirting tax laws using their brand name and they reported it to the IRS to avoid any collusion claims ahead of time would that be fascist? If not then how is that different?
      - jnbiche 8y ago
        The point of the article is that a unusually high number of businesses targeted for these actions happened to be critiques of corporate 7-Eleven, or engaged in lawsuits. And yes, I would worry likewise if it were taxes used as the underlying cause for these kinds of raids. Again, I'm explicitly not calling this "fascism". I said "emblematic of fascism". I actually don't think we've descended into fascism yet. But as a country, we're getting comfortable with situations that could lead us to a very bad place. Finally, could someone please vouch for my flagged top-level comment, as it's not breaking any HN guidelines as far as I'm aware?
ericfrenkiel 8y ago
The title is crafted so salaciously as to make victims of the real criminals: SMB owners deliberately hiring illegal immigrants because they are easily exploitable. Some of the franchisees were literally stealing money from their hires. I don’t see why we should be lamenting people who abuse and prey on others because of their immigration status.
- jnbiche 8y ago
  That's not primarily what the article is investigating. The article is pointing out 7-Eleven's alleged use of ICE and Homeland Security to target those franchisees who criticized or filed lawsuits against the corporation.
  - lostmsu 8y ago
    Yet, there're no proofs in the article, that raids and criticism are related in any way.
    - camgunz 8y ago
      > One goal was to build cases to terminate franchise agreements, according to former employees interviewed by Bloomberg and lawsuits filed across the U.S. The tactics could be aggressive. In a 2014 lawsuit, Adnan Khan, a leader of 7-Eleven franchisees in California, alleged that a company investigator followed him for months in an unmarked car and at one point hit and injured him with the vehicle. 7-Eleven settled the suit. I mean, articles don't have burdens of proof so to speak, but it's not like they did _no_ research.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
- arthurofbabylon 8y ago
  You could read this article (and its title) several ways. I read it as an exposée on abusive practices throughout the hierarchy, sans lament.
DigitalWheelie 8y ago
It's not that 7-Eleven franchisees are being investigate for hiring illegal immigrants, it's that the corporate office might be using this as a way to intimidate franchise owners it doesn't like. 'Still, franchisees, after years of conflict with the company, went from suspicious to paranoid when word spread that ICE had shown up at stores run by men and women who were in legal disputes with 7-Eleven or were prominent critics of [CEO Joseph ] DePinto.'
blakesterz 8y ago
"The company’s 2017 disclosure documents give the example of a store in Chicago with $1 million in annual sales. After all the fees and costs and taking into account that the company’s share of the take rises as revenue increases, the franchise owner took home $37,000 before taxes. “7-Eleven always sold its franchises as a gold mine,” says Hashim Syed, a former 7-Eleven franchisee and ex-president of the Chicago franchisee-owners association. “I say it’s more like a coal mine.”" That sounds brutal!
- jefftk 8y ago
  $37k to the owner on $1M in revenue would be a profit margin of 3.7%. This looks higher than the average profit of ~2%. The $1M sales figure doesn't include the cost of what they're selling, their rent, or wages for their workers. [1] https://retailowner.com/Benchmarks/Food-and-Beverage-Stores/Convenience-Stores#ixzz3PiMI3QNo https://retailowner.com/Benchmarks/Food-and-Beverage-Stores/...
- lostmsu 8y ago
  It does not until you know the operating margins. Why did not they name company's share of profits explicitly?
- winningcontinue 8y ago
  That is brutal for all the stress & hours a franchise owner would have to work themselves to make the store profitable. I wonder who handles the money losing promotions financially, the corporate or small business owner?
sinnet11 8y ago
I think there is a deeper issue here with immigration labor. The only one's applying to work at 7-11 or a lot of these minimum wage jobs are people who are not dependable or are immigrants without the proper paper work. So if you hire the non dependable worker you are going to be going through the hiring process every 3 months. Most people you'd like to hire often say "Why would I come work for you when Uber pays me X?" Uber has made it a lot harder to find dependable workers for convenience stores because most stores aren't willing to raise the wage so high that would eat away into their profit of owning a store in the process. I'm all for fair wage practices but at a certain point you'll be seeing a lot more 7-11's for sale than people willing to buy them. The economics will stop making sense to purchase convenience stores or rather start many small businesses because the wage to pay out will be too high.
- notable_user 8y ago
  Prices will go up and it’ll balance out.
- lotsofpulp 8y ago
  >I'm all for fair wage practices but at a certain point you'll be seeing a lot more 7-11's for sale than people willing to buy them. If a business wants to sell widgets, and they can't afford to pay for the materials to make the widgets, then it raises prices for the widgets, or it finds that consumers don't find enough value in the widgets to justify the higher price and the business shuts down. Why should it be any different for a convenient store?
davidkuhta 8y ago
For a second I thought frozen water was causing a massive management disturbance at 7-Eleven... #prettyurlproblems "eleven-is-at-war-with-its-own-franchisees-over-ice-raids" I wish that had been the story :/
lupire 8y ago
The real story here is that the business of large corporations, from 7-11 to Uber, is to outsource all their legal, financial, and safety risk, while keeping the profits. 7-11 regulates every aspect of a franchise business, and takes a large fee, but if the franchise breaks any law, 7-11 takes no responsibility. Imagine if every company ran that way, sending rank-and-file employees to jail, while management and limited-liability owners face no criminal or civil penalties because they "didn't know" their profits came from illegal activity. Or they didn't have to pay worker's comp for employees injured on the job. Or employees had to pay for all their supplies.

111 points by robg 8y ago

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

While there seems like a desire to blame 7-Eleven here, they are completely right to not want to have their franchisees violating federal immigration laws. While they are insulated by the contractor-contractee relationship, the government is humourless about these sorts of things. The violations are easy to prove (either you have proper employment documentation or you don’t) and enforcement is politically popular. That’s a bad combination from a corporate risk management point of view.

supercanuck 8y ago
Sounds like immigration is gonna be this generation's "War on Drugs"
- toomuchtodo 8y ago
  Not a lot of good solutions. Can't let everyone in. No one cares for merit based immigration like other countries (ie Canada) because pro-immigration supporters want others than the best to have a shot, and no one wants quotas because it'll clamp down on immigration from countries with large populations (China and India).
  - esotericn 8y ago
    The US was founded on immigration. > Can't let everyone in. Why not?
    - toomuchtodo 8y ago
      Because it breaks your economy and social fabric (super simplified for the sake of fitting a decent reply into one short HN comment). We're at the lowest level of unemployment in decades, and wages are barely moving up. Bringing in large amounts of unskilled workers (remember, skilled workers get in on merit) would only delay wages rising (or those unskilled workers are going to be working under the table in jobs like slaughter houses, dairy farms, and other hazardous work environments where they will have no recourse when they're injured or maimed). Some immigrants want to integrate with American society, but not all (and that is what is expected of you as an immigrant, to share and hold our values in the same regard citizens do). Europe has had its fair share of troubles with economic migrants. This isn't about race, this is about economic systems and the social stability of your host country. I support an immigration pipeline that gets skilled workers into the US as fast as possible (most especially in the healthcare field), but that's not what's on the public policy table.
      - moorhosj 8y ago
        Immigration is at generationally low levels, I don’t see how you could blame it for lack of wage increases. What about the stagnant minimum wage, record corporate profits or union busting; might they play a role? “American society” and “our values” are by-products of immigration, how would more immigrants ruin that?
        toomuchtodo 8y ago
        > What about the stagnant minimum wage, record corporate profits or union busting might they play a role? I don't discount that these are major contributors to the problem. Adding additional labor supply, supply willing to work for almost nothing, does not help the problem.
        moorhosj 8y ago
        Growing the pie has always helped everyone in America. Is there something that has fundamentally changed in your view to alter this trend? Are there Americans out there who want to do these types of jobs?
    - briandear 8y ago
      Imagine if the entire population of Bangladesh were suddenly added to the state of California. You’d quickly become the third world because no country could handle that sort of influx. Just the act of building enough schools would bankrupt the state. Not to mention any other social services — and the only benefit to the country initially would be simply millions of unskilled workers — which would drive wages to near zero. If you enforce minimum wages, then you’d have massive unemployment. Immigration should be fair, measured and designed around a policy of quick assimilation, both for the benefit of the immigrant and the existing citizens.
      - mynameisvlad 8y ago
        That's not realistic. Even remotely. There won't be some sudden influx because getting to the United States alone is hard. For most people, it'll be a transoceanic flight which is not very cheap at all.
        int_19h 8y ago
        Speaking as an immigrant - trust me, there would be. Yes, you wouldn't get the entire population of the Third World overnight. But even the amount that could afford it (or would save to afford it if they knew they had that option) would be orders of magnitude more, and would overwhelm the country.
      - rayiner 8y ago
        This should not be down voted. I am from Bangladesh. You’re leaving out the fact that your hypothetical would also destroy our social fabric. Fully 1/3 of the population of the country believes that I should be executed for leaving Islam: http://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-beliefs-about-sharia http://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-religi.... That makes Bangladesh very moderate compared to say Pakistan where that number is 2/3.
    - pixl97 8y ago
      Why dont you ask the native Americans about that.
      - camgunz 8y ago
        Are you drawing a comparison between what the US did to Native Americans and what immigrants might do to us? That is such a dangerous, slanderous, ignorant comment that I really have to question your motives.
        Aloha 8y ago
        Is it? Our ancestors tried to annihilate natives in almost totality (physically first, then just culturally) - why is it a shock that some Americans would be afraid of the same thing happening to us? I mean one of the hallmarks of American culture is subsuming the culture of the newly arrived into our own - it not unconscionable to think that some Americans think all peoples/cultures have that same impulse. I'm generally pro-immigration, but you need to have immigrants that want to be Americans, not people who want to bring their culture with them and pass it down. That means people who understand freedom of speech, democratic values, and largely either speak, or are willing to learn english.
        rayiner 8y ago
        As an immigrant myself, that is certainly what my family thought they were signing up for when they came here. Indeed, we left Bangladesh precisely because it was turning away from western culture and values. I think, for the most part, immigrants today feel that way too. (There is evidence that Spanish speaking immigrants are taking up English faster than German speaking immigrants did). What scares me are the (I think well meaning but misguided) liberals who deny that assimilation is imperative.
        Aloha 8y ago
        I guess they assume that assimilation is bad, and is causing some cultural havoc - Whereas you and I both feel that assimilation is an imperative, While the newly arrived have historically wanted to do everything they can to be american, some old fashioned and/or non-americas values will always remain for them - they didnt grow up fully immersed in our culture. In any case assimilation is what will happen, with it mostly locked in by the first native born generation, and fully locked in by the second native born generation. I'm glad you and your family are here, adding to our rich tapestry of culture and experiences.
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > Not a lot of good solutions. There are a lot of easy improvements; there's no perfect solution, but this is a perfect is the enemy of the good situation. > Can't let everyone in. There are two halves of this: Not everyone is personally acceptable as an immigrant; there are reasons for prohibition based on individual history. You can't let everyone who isn't individually prohibited in for free because assimilating immigrants has costs. The US has a basically reasonable approach (perhaps wanting some tweaks in details) for the first, but less than ideal handling of the second; most notably, aside from issues with the design of some of the available visa categories like H-1B, hard per-category caps and even moreso, per-country caps on visa categories exacerbate supply/demand imbalances for which the natural consequence is illegal migration. > No one cares for merit based immigration like other countries US preference categories, which are the basis of virtually all legal immigration, are merit-based, though you may not like then particular notion of merit on which they are based. > and no one wants quotas We have both per-category, and within each category per-country, quotas, and lots of people want them (and many want them to be smaller.) It's not a good policy, but many people absolutely do.want them. > because it'll clamp down on immigration from countries with large populations (China and India). Well, the particular formula effects countries with large number of people qualified and seeking to immigrate, which depending on the Visa category includes Mexico, the Phillipines, China, and India (and I think a couple others in a few categories.) Population has an indirect role, but it's not the direct driver of quota imbalance.
- ryandrake 8y ago
  Which generation? This is being planned and executed by the same people that conducted (and failed) the war on drugs.
  - zzzcpan 8y ago
    Why do you think it failed? I imagine failure of the war on drugs would be a revolution. That didn't happen, so the war on drugs didn't fail. War on drugs was never about drugs.
    - ryandrake 8y ago
      Good point. The War on Drugs stated goal of getting rid of an arbitrary subset of drugs and their users failed. The real goal, oppression and mass-incarceration of dark skinned and poor people, was a pretty resounding success. They’ve at least dropped the pretext with the War on Immigrants. The stated goal is the real goal: oppression, deportation and mass-incarceration of (primarily dark skinned and poor) foreigners and immigrants.
      - briandear 8y ago
        > War on Immigrants Immigrants and illegal aliens are different. Legal immigrants aren’t getting oppressed, deported without cause or mass incarcerated. The clever wordplay to conflate immigrants with illegal aliens is rather effective because it creates a convienent xenophobic narrative, when the truth is that a majority of Americans are against illegal aliens but for legal immigrants.
      - Aloha 8y ago
        It's not really targeting poor people, or dark skinned people - it's targeting people that the elites of the time saw as 'morally deficient' - most malum prohibitum laws target moral perceptions of moral deficiency - or try to preserve notions of a static society.
    - vezycash 8y ago
      Downvoted you initially but changed it to an upvote after reading it three times. Clarification: Iff the war on drugs was designed to systematically imprison Blacks, then the war's been largely successful.
lvspiff 8y ago
I agree - it will be interesting to see what happens when other franchisee owned corps catch on - a lot of pizza, hamburger, and other fast food shops are filled with immigrant workers. Then there comes the hotels and casinos, and then things like cleaning companies. All employ large numbers of immigrants that if the govt were to raid could cause issues for. Until the US has a comprehensive immigration plan and a better way to verify legal working status corps will use this law as a way to take back from franchisees.
crawfordcomeaux 8y ago
Sounds like corporate risk management is violent and dehumanizing. Maybe it's time for humane strategies for managing human systems?
mabbo 8y ago
While I agree with you, I also feel that 7-Eleven Corporate has taken the wrong approach to this. They've made it "me vs you" rather than "us vs the problem". They're pushing the franchisees in aggressive ways to extract more money out of them to start and then hiring a police force to spy on them. Now it sounds like they're sending out ICE against anyone who criticizes them, even those not breaking the law. That's not a healthy relationship. When corporate pushes margins thinner and thinner, only those willing to break laws will be able to survive. Take the money being spent on surveillance vans and ex-cops and instead spend it on incentive systems, on committees of franchisees, of groups designed around "how can we solve this problem?". Stop using a heavy hand and start working with the other side. They're not the enemy here, they're the lifeblood of the company.
- lostmsu 8y ago
  > Now it sounds like they're sending out ICE against anyone who criticizes them, even those not breaking the law. I guess the article's author were successful in fooling readers. Nowhere in the article does it say that happened ever. Only that rumors about that became widespread (now even more with this article).
  - Latteland 8y ago
    The article strongly suggests that is what is happening though. If 7-11 was really worried about it, they'd send them to every 7-11. They don't want to do that because it would make everyone mad, and I bet they don't do it to the franchises they own.
notacoward 8y ago
Selective enforcement even of an just law (or contract clause) is itself unjust. That's what the article's about - not that 7-11 is trying to enforce the rules, but that they are selectively enforcing against certain franchisees, and using taxpayer-funded muscle to do it. Imagine if use of work computers for anything personal was a widely violated rule where you work, but the only people who ever seemed to get busted were the ones who had made complaints to HR, and they brought in the FBI to do it in the most intimidating and humiliating way possible. But hey, they did wrong, so the company's morally right? No.

lotsofpulp 8y ago

Are these claims below true? I was under the impression that a in a franchisor - franchisee relationship, the franchisee owns the business, and they are paying the franchisor to use the brand according to whatever standards are agreed upon. But I've never heard of a franchisor being able to "take over" a business, or do payroll for a franchisee. I've only ever heard of a a franchisee having to stop using the franchisor's name and possibly paying some monetary penalties as defined in the franchising agreement, but what's described below sounds crazy. > Store owners found in violation of immigration law could be in breach of their franchise agreements. And as they well know, 7-Eleven has the contractual right to take back a store from someone who’s violated his or her agreement. >An accumulation of four breaches in two years can give the company cause to terminate an agreement and take over the store. >Store owners are required to deposit all sales receipts into a 7-Eleven bank account. The corporate payroll department in Dallas reviews time sheets for each employee, deducts taxes, and sends workers their pay, sometimes on debit cards that don’t require a bank account. Franchisees’ earnings are deposited in their personal bank accounts.

berbec 8y ago
This is totally possible and not out of line with other agreements. I know of one agreement that requires the franchisee to pay corporate's legal fees if a lawsuit resulted from actions in the store.
- lotsofpulp 8y ago
  I've seen that too, but that's also just monetary penalties. From the agreements I've seen for hotels, there was never any equity involved, and the franchisor definitely didn't want anything to do with payroll. In fact, being shielded from that kind of liability is one of the perks of being a franchisor, so it's very surprising that 7-Eleven would even want to be a part of that. I can see wanting to track sales and whatnot so they can verify that they're getting their cut, but I see no benefit to 7-Eleven corporate to getting involved with the staffing, it's not like their royalties would be effected. And they would get to put all the blame on the franchisee when problems like this occur.
8y ago

jnbiche 8y ago

I know there are folks on here who will roll their eyes, but this kind of display is emblematic of a fascist government. Fascism is the bonding of state and corporate power, driven by nationalism, authoritarianism, and a (usually) charismatic leader. For the record, I'm not a radical. I'm not even particularly partisan. I'm an average, middle-class American. But I've read enough history to know which way the wind is blowing in this country. I only hope we can come to our senses before it's truly too late.

tomschlick 8y ago
> but this kind of display is emblematic of a fascist government Enforcing immigration law passed by a democratically elected congress is fascist? Really?
- jnbiche 8y ago
  No, a corporation using a federal law enforcement agency to target owners who were disfavored by the corporation is typical of fascism. I'm not even interested in this fake debate that was stirred up about immigration. Of course we have to have enforced borders. Of course we need immigration laws that will be enforced. What concerns me is the collaboration between corporations and state power, all taking place in an atmosphere of acute nationalism.
  - tomschlick 8y ago
    Would you see it the same way if it were related to taxes? As in, if 7-11 found out certain franchisee's were skirting tax laws using their brand name and they reported it to the IRS to avoid any collusion claims ahead of time would that be fascist? If not then how is that different?
    - jnbiche 8y ago
      The point of the article is that a unusually high number of businesses targeted for these actions happened to be critiques of corporate 7-Eleven, or engaged in lawsuits. And yes, I would worry likewise if it were taxes used as the underlying cause for these kinds of raids. Again, I'm explicitly not calling this "fascism". I said "emblematic of fascism". I actually don't think we've descended into fascism yet. But as a country, we're getting comfortable with situations that could lead us to a very bad place. Finally, could someone please vouch for my flagged top-level comment, as it's not breaking any HN guidelines as far as I'm aware?

ericfrenkiel 8y ago

The title is crafted so salaciously as to make victims of the real criminals: SMB owners deliberately hiring illegal immigrants because they are easily exploitable. Some of the franchisees were literally stealing money from their hires. I don’t see why we should be lamenting people who abuse and prey on others because of their immigration status.

jnbiche 8y ago
That's not primarily what the article is investigating. The article is pointing out 7-Eleven's alleged use of ICE and Homeland Security to target those franchisees who criticized or filed lawsuits against the corporation.
- lostmsu 8y ago
  Yet, there're no proofs in the article, that raids and criticism are related in any way.
  - camgunz 8y ago
    > One goal was to build cases to terminate franchise agreements, according to former employees interviewed by Bloomberg and lawsuits filed across the U.S. The tactics could be aggressive. In a 2014 lawsuit, Adnan Khan, a leader of 7-Eleven franchisees in California, alleged that a company investigator followed him for months in an unmarked car and at one point hit and injured him with the vehicle. 7-Eleven settled the suit. I mean, articles don't have burdens of proof so to speak, but it's not like they did _no_ research.
- deleted 8y ago
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arthurofbabylon 8y ago
You could read this article (and its title) several ways. I read it as an exposée on abusive practices throughout the hierarchy, sans lament.

DigitalWheelie 8y ago

It's not that 7-Eleven franchisees are being investigate for hiring illegal immigrants, it's that the corporate office might be using this as a way to intimidate franchise owners it doesn't like. 'Still, franchisees, after years of conflict with the company, went from suspicious to paranoid when word spread that ICE had shown up at stores run by men and women who were in legal disputes with 7-Eleven or were prominent critics of [CEO Joseph ] DePinto.'

blakesterz 8y ago

"The company’s 2017 disclosure documents give the example of a store in Chicago with $1 million in annual sales. After all the fees and costs and taking into account that the company’s share of the take rises as revenue increases, the franchise owner took home $37,000 before taxes. “7-Eleven always sold its franchises as a gold mine,” says Hashim Syed, a former 7-Eleven franchisee and ex-president of the Chicago franchisee-owners association. “I say it’s more like a coal mine.”" That sounds brutal!

jefftk 8y ago
$37k to the owner on $1M in revenue would be a profit margin of 3.7%. This looks higher than the average profit of ~2%. The $1M sales figure doesn't include the cost of what they're selling, their rent, or wages for their workers. [1] https://retailowner.com/Benchmarks/Food-and-Beverage-Stores/Convenience-Stores#ixzz3PiMI3QNo https://retailowner.com/Benchmarks/Food-and-Beverage-Stores/...
lostmsu 8y ago
It does not until you know the operating margins. Why did not they name company's share of profits explicitly?
winningcontinue 8y ago
That is brutal for all the stress & hours a franchise owner would have to work themselves to make the store profitable. I wonder who handles the money losing promotions financially, the corporate or small business owner?

sinnet11 8y ago

I think there is a deeper issue here with immigration labor. The only one's applying to work at 7-11 or a lot of these minimum wage jobs are people who are not dependable or are immigrants without the proper paper work. So if you hire the non dependable worker you are going to be going through the hiring process every 3 months. Most people you'd like to hire often say "Why would I come work for you when Uber pays me X?" Uber has made it a lot harder to find dependable workers for convenience stores because most stores aren't willing to raise the wage so high that would eat away into their profit of owning a store in the process. I'm all for fair wage practices but at a certain point you'll be seeing a lot more 7-11's for sale than people willing to buy them. The economics will stop making sense to purchase convenience stores or rather start many small businesses because the wage to pay out will be too high.

notable_user 8y ago
Prices will go up and it’ll balance out.
lotsofpulp 8y ago
>I'm all for fair wage practices but at a certain point you'll be seeing a lot more 7-11's for sale than people willing to buy them. If a business wants to sell widgets, and they can't afford to pay for the materials to make the widgets, then it raises prices for the widgets, or it finds that consumers don't find enough value in the widgets to justify the higher price and the business shuts down. Why should it be any different for a convenient store?

davidkuhta 8y ago

For a second I thought frozen water was causing a massive management disturbance at 7-Eleven... #prettyurlproblems "eleven-is-at-war-with-its-own-franchisees-over-ice-raids" I wish that had been the story :/

lupire 8y ago

The real story here is that the business of large corporations, from 7-11 to Uber, is to outsource all their legal, financial, and safety risk, while keeping the profits. 7-11 regulates every aspect of a franchise business, and takes a large fee, but if the franchise breaks any law, 7-11 takes no responsibility. Imagine if every company ran that way, sending rank-and-file employees to jail, while management and limited-liability owners face no criminal or civil penalties because they "didn't know" their profits came from illegal activity. Or they didn't have to pay worker's comp for employees injured on the job. Or employees had to pay for all their supplies.