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We all know wages aren't dependant on education, otherwise teachers and scientists would be rich. But they're not. Also, most of the waiters I know have at le

We all know wages aren't dependant on education, otherwise teachers and scientists would be rich. But they're not. Also, most of the waiters I know have at least one university degree. Many have multiple, or a graduate degree. Not to mention, good waiters know about food, wine, spirits and have the soft skills required to put up with people who frequent restaurants. Anyhow, barrier to entry is a bad excuse. Education does not equal a good living.

JamesBarney 8y ago
I deliberately avoided using the word good because otherwise we go down a rabbit hole talking about what makes a good engineer versus a good waiter. > Education does not equal a good living No but it is heavily correlated with one. There are plenty of restaurants that will hire an 18 year old with no experience and literally no qualifications to be a waiter. Lots of places when they are looking for experienced staff just hire anyone who had any waiting experience. They aren't nearly as picky as development managers. I don't know of any software companies that will just hire an 18 year old to write their code without any training or experience. Without a 4 year degree I've seen it take people usually a year or longer of spending all of their free time coding to get their first coding job. But if you think it's as easy to get your first waiting job as software engineering job(which is very different from my friends experience who has done both), what do you think is the cause of the wage discrepancy?
- Mikeb85 8y ago
  > There are plenty of restaurants that will hire an 18 year old with no experience and literally no qualifications to be a waiter. And they'll likely be working in a chain restaurant barely making more than minimum wage, not breaking $20K per year. > Lots of places when they are looking for experienced staff just hire anyone who had any waiting experience. And again, waiters in such a situation will likely not be making much money. To actually make $60K or more as a waiter, you need to have selling ability, wine knowledge and the skills to get into a better restaurant. You likely won't see anywhere close to this until you have 5 or more years of good experience (not unlike getting a traditional education). If you're working at Chili's (or equivalent), lets say the average person spends $30. You serve 30 people in a night, that's $900 in sales (18% is $160). Now let's say you work in a high end steakhouse, steaks can run $50 each, appetizers $25 each, and then there's wine. Bottles can run anywhere from $50 to thousands. But let's say you sell a $120 bottle, which is a pretty common price-point in those types of restaurants. For a table of 2, 2 appetizers, 2 steaks and that bottle of wine adds up to $135/per person. Times 30 people per night, around $4K in sales, with tips being $780 (although, in reality, some of that goes to your support staff - bussers, host, sommelier). Anyhow no, a coder won't get a great job right away. And a server won't get a lucrative job right away. You still need to build up to that point in the restaurant industry. You can't just do what cooks and waiters do at places like Eleven Madison Park, Benu, Saison, etc... without lots of training and experience. So why shouldn't it be a possibility for a restaurant worker to make a 'professional' income?
  - JamesBarney 8y ago
    But now your comparing an entry level developer to someone who works at Saison, or the top 1% of waiters against the average developer. I'm not arguing that a restaurant worker shouldn't make a professional income, I'm arguing why they don't. Do you think it's a conspiracy by restaurant owners to keep down wages?

JamesBarney 8y ago

I deliberately avoided using the word good because otherwise we go down a rabbit hole talking about what makes a good engineer versus a good waiter. > Education does not equal a good living No but it is heavily correlated with one. There are plenty of restaurants that will hire an 18 year old with no experience and literally no qualifications to be a waiter. Lots of places when they are looking for experienced staff just hire anyone who had any waiting experience. They aren't nearly as picky as development managers. I don't know of any software companies that will just hire an 18 year old to write their code without any training or experience. Without a 4 year degree I've seen it take people usually a year or longer of spending all of their free time coding to get their first coding job. But if you think it's as easy to get your first waiting job as software engineering job(which is very different from my friends experience who has done both), what do you think is the cause of the wage discrepancy?

Mikeb85 8y ago
> There are plenty of restaurants that will hire an 18 year old with no experience and literally no qualifications to be a waiter. And they'll likely be working in a chain restaurant barely making more than minimum wage, not breaking $20K per year. > Lots of places when they are looking for experienced staff just hire anyone who had any waiting experience. And again, waiters in such a situation will likely not be making much money. To actually make $60K or more as a waiter, you need to have selling ability, wine knowledge and the skills to get into a better restaurant. You likely won't see anywhere close to this until you have 5 or more years of good experience (not unlike getting a traditional education). If you're working at Chili's (or equivalent), lets say the average person spends $30. You serve 30 people in a night, that's $900 in sales (18% is $160). Now let's say you work in a high end steakhouse, steaks can run $50 each, appetizers $25 each, and then there's wine. Bottles can run anywhere from $50 to thousands. But let's say you sell a $120 bottle, which is a pretty common price-point in those types of restaurants. For a table of 2, 2 appetizers, 2 steaks and that bottle of wine adds up to $135/per person. Times 30 people per night, around $4K in sales, with tips being $780 (although, in reality, some of that goes to your support staff - bussers, host, sommelier). Anyhow no, a coder won't get a great job right away. And a server won't get a lucrative job right away. You still need to build up to that point in the restaurant industry. You can't just do what cooks and waiters do at places like Eleven Madison Park, Benu, Saison, etc... without lots of training and experience. So why shouldn't it be a possibility for a restaurant worker to make a 'professional' income?
- JamesBarney 8y ago
  But now your comparing an entry level developer to someone who works at Saison, or the top 1% of waiters against the average developer. I'm not arguing that a restaurant worker shouldn't make a professional income, I'm arguing why they don't. Do you think it's a conspiracy by restaurant owners to keep down wages?