46 ms·

Mcdonalds Hires 62,000 in National Event - 1,000,000+ Applications Received

21 points by chailatte 16y ago

PaulHoule 16y ago
PR. Fast food chains have high turnover. People are always leaving, so even if McDonalds was slowly contracting, they'd be hiring new people at a high rate. This press release does create a sense of optimism about the economy which might be justified. The economy looks pretty good from my position, but could look pretty lousy to somebody who's unemployed. My feeling is that people have been getting pessimistic because of $4 gas and the talk about the federal deficit. I see a lot of evidence that companies of various sorts are moving forward with initiatives all over the place so I'm a believer in the recovery.
- Natsu 16y ago
  Yeah, it feels like things are improving from my perspective, too. I'm a sysadmin for a factory and it does seem like our incoming orders generally correlate with news about the economy. Lately, there's been more talk of new business and such, which makes me feel like things are on the rebound. But like you said, perspectives vary.
  - PaulHoule 16y ago
    It's funny, particularly when you break it down by region. Tompkins County, where I live and work, has a 5.9% unemployment rate (one of the lowest in the U.S.) but I haven't worked for a company that's actually based in Tompkins for years. We hear a lot of talk about a "new tech bubble" in Silicon Valley but San Jose has an unemployment rate of 10.6% which is worse than the national average. If you're one of those workers that Google and Facebook are fighting over, however, it probably seems pretty good to you. Las Vegas still seems to be one of the worst affected places, and I think it's the very success of the gambling industry that's killing Vegas. It seems that in most parts of the country there is a halfway decent casino within a few hour's drive... Why would anybody want to pay $300+ for an airline ticket and to get groped by the T.S.A.?
reader5000 16y ago
So McDonalds is now approximately as selective as Harvard [1]. [1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/30/college-admissions-rates-_n_842807.html#s259866&title=Clark_University_672 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/30/college-admissions-....
- cynest 16y ago
  When you consider only the nontrivial applications in each, McDonalds is probably more selective.
jordan0day 16y ago
On one hand, I want to say good on them. While I'm sure this was mostly a PR thing, at a time when unemployment is high (especially for unskilled laborers) any news like "62,000 new hires" seems like good news. On the other hand, 62,000 new employees nationwide breaks down to something like 3-4 new employees per store. This sort of large-scale, top-down action seems like it has huge potentials to create inefficiencies. How many of these new hires will be let go in a month because they're not needed? Maybe none, maybe there really were 62,000 positions to be filled nationwide and each store was able to hire the exact right number of folks. Which brings me to my third hand, that is, a well-publicized "national hiring event" certainly was smart -- it probably brings in a much larger pool of applicants, letting them select more well-qualified people all at once, rather than on an ad-hoc basis.
- phirephly 16y ago
  Or they hire 3-4 new people, which gives them the man power to make sure 8-12 other people never get over-time, or knock a few of them down to part-time to strip them of benefits.
orijing 16y ago
I'm confused. Isn't McDonalds franchised? How come it can direct its franchisees to hire people that it (maybe) does not need? Can someone clarify this, since it appears that I'm the only one confused?
glhaynes 16y ago
Why would McDonald's have been understaffed by 62,000 people? Unless they're planning on opening a ton of new stores, why would they suddenly need to hire so many at once?
- natesm 16y ago
  These comments sum it up pretty nicely: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2498841 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2498841 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2499044 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2499044 3 or 4 people per store is very low and is probably not that different, if at all, from typical hiring practices. They just synchronized these ones up for an event. It's also almost summer - college students might be quitting their jobs to leave for the summer, and high school students might be getting hired.

21 points by chailatte 16y ago

PR. Fast food chains have high turnover. People are always leaving, so even if McDonalds was slowly contracting, they'd be hiring new people at a high rate. This press release does create a sense of optimism about the economy which might be justified. The economy looks pretty good from my position, but could look pretty lousy to somebody who's unemployed. My feeling is that people have been getting pessimistic because of $4 gas and the talk about the federal deficit. I see a lot of evidence that companies of various sorts are moving forward with initiatives all over the place so I'm a believer in the recovery.

Natsu 16y ago
Yeah, it feels like things are improving from my perspective, too. I'm a sysadmin for a factory and it does seem like our incoming orders generally correlate with news about the economy. Lately, there's been more talk of new business and such, which makes me feel like things are on the rebound. But like you said, perspectives vary.
- PaulHoule 16y ago
  It's funny, particularly when you break it down by region. Tompkins County, where I live and work, has a 5.9% unemployment rate (one of the lowest in the U.S.) but I haven't worked for a company that's actually based in Tompkins for years. We hear a lot of talk about a "new tech bubble" in Silicon Valley but San Jose has an unemployment rate of 10.6% which is worse than the national average. If you're one of those workers that Google and Facebook are fighting over, however, it probably seems pretty good to you. Las Vegas still seems to be one of the worst affected places, and I think it's the very success of the gambling industry that's killing Vegas. It seems that in most parts of the country there is a halfway decent casino within a few hour's drive... Why would anybody want to pay $300+ for an airline ticket and to get groped by the T.S.A.?

reader5000 16y ago

So McDonalds is now approximately as selective as Harvard [1]. [1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/30/college-admissions-rates-_n_842807.html#s259866&title=Clark_University_672 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/30/college-admissions-....

cynest 16y ago
When you consider only the nontrivial applications in each, McDonalds is probably more selective.

jordan0day 16y ago

On one hand, I want to say good on them. While I'm sure this was mostly a PR thing, at a time when unemployment is high (especially for unskilled laborers) any news like "62,000 new hires" seems like good news. On the other hand, 62,000 new employees nationwide breaks down to something like 3-4 new employees per store. This sort of large-scale, top-down action seems like it has huge potentials to create inefficiencies. How many of these new hires will be let go in a month because they're not needed? Maybe none, maybe there really were 62,000 positions to be filled nationwide and each store was able to hire the exact right number of folks. Which brings me to my third hand, that is, a well-publicized "national hiring event" certainly was smart -- it probably brings in a much larger pool of applicants, letting them select more well-qualified people all at once, rather than on an ad-hoc basis.

phirephly 16y ago
Or they hire 3-4 new people, which gives them the man power to make sure 8-12 other people never get over-time, or knock a few of them down to part-time to strip them of benefits.

orijing 16y ago

I'm confused. Isn't McDonalds franchised? How come it can direct its franchisees to hire people that it (maybe) does not need? Can someone clarify this, since it appears that I'm the only one confused?

glhaynes 16y ago

Why would McDonald's have been understaffed by 62,000 people? Unless they're planning on opening a ton of new stores, why would they suddenly need to hire so many at once?

natesm 16y ago
These comments sum it up pretty nicely: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2498841 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2498841 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2499044 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2499044 3 or 4 people per store is very low and is probably not that different, if at all, from typical hiring practices. They just synchronized these ones up for an event. It's also almost summer - college students might be quitting their jobs to leave for the summer, and high school students might be getting hired.