Archived Being told to "Work faster"
- Thread starter SnowWhiteOfAnA
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What I said was ..... IF you can make ends meet
... I never said deserve. At least quote me correctly.
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Not mooch necessarily but share costs with yes.
You seem to think that life owes you something. It doesn’t.
Entry level positions at a Target store are not designed to be long term careers because they require minimal brain power to competently complete. That’s why they’re... entry... level.
When you can pull a 15 year old off the street and give them 90 days of experience to warm up with and they’re doing your job as well or better than you, you best believe that job isn’t going to pay a living wage.
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You’re right.
And guess what? Target is a shitty company to work for. It didn’t used to be and it’s a shame that it is now but it is what it is and it’s not going to change. Target is going to take the KMart and many other big box retailer routes of slowly dying over many many years because of mismanagement at the top and greed at the top.
And to the point... there isn’t a playbook, you’re right. It’s called having some modicum of sense to the most basic level of understanding that you’re going to have a hell of a time making those ends meet if you are your only source of income, especially if you are supporting anyone. If the job can be filled by over 99% of the 15+ year old population with minimal training, you aren’t going to be working in a career level job. Period.
Therefore, entry level jobs at Target aren’t career level jobs... unless you want to argue that being able to wholeheartedly support yourself isn’t a part of having a career level job... at which point I will just say that’s absurd and we will just have to disagree.
I’m sure there are people out there that just cashier for 40 hours a week and are somehow able to support themselves completely independent of outside assistance but they would be nearing statistical irrelevance for the purpose of discussing the overarching point.
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Give me 90 days training, and I can take your insurance adjuster job from you!. Lol....it has to do with supply. And your wrong about the wages being too high. If they don't raise, then they won't keep up in hiring competition.
TTGOz
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Here's my counter to that. I'm going to avoid getting political.
There was a period in time where Americans could work on a farm, work at a gas station, work at a grocery store, and work literally anywhere and be able to pay for; College, a house, car insurance, utilities, house insurance, car loan, gas, etc, and still have money left over.
The thing that's wrong with the argument that entry-level retail workers don't deserve a higher minimum wage is that making $12.00/hr and not getting a consistent 40 hour week all year long is definitely not doable with all of these things. What once was no longer is. Things are much more expensive, look at the housing trends, college tuition trends, everything is expensive. The Government taxes the ever living hell out of everything. Oh, you bought a car you need to drive? Let us take an extra 30% of your total sale price. You need to register your car, but there's a $40 fee on top of sales tax! Oh, you wanna buy a house? Prepare to get fucked by your city's new property tax levy that increased from 15% to 16.5% last fiscal year. The government federally mandates you get insurance on literally everything or we're gonna fine you for all of your money or you risk a year of jail time.
The point I'm trying to make is it is expensive to be alive right now. It's definitely some people's faults for choosing to stay with multi-billionaire corporation Target, but that doesn't mean there are dozens of other companies and corporations paying full-time employees $11.50/hr.
My next counter to your entry-level jobs aren't career jobs is simply this; It's entry-level for reason, you're right, but you're not thinking about the bigger picture. Entry-level means you're at the bottom of the barrel, but that doesn't mean you can't work your way up and burst out of the barrel. I know plenty of people who started at Target as just a TM making $8.50/hr back earlier in the 2000's and made their way up to Sr. TL making damn near $30/hr. Entry level positions should be viewed as an opportunity to do better in a company, and thus can be a career job.
Current US Inflation Rates: 2008-2018 - https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/inflation/current-inflation-rates/
Inflation has been pretty awful, the recession in 2006-2007 until Obama's second term didn't help much either.
U.S. - projected inflation rate 2008-2023 | Statista - https://www.statista.com/statistics/244983/projected-inflation-rate-in-the-united-states/
The inflation rate isn't projected to be going down at all, either. The economy barely holds on because corporations and businesses have to pay employees less than a dime a dollar to keep products low.
The Inflation Calculator - https://westegg.com/inflation/
Play around with this thing, I typed in $1 for 1970 and in 2017 $1 is roughly $6.47 now.
In 1990, $1 costs about $1.90 today. Everything is literally 2x the cost it use to be just thirty years ago. I'll admit I don't have a whole 100% understanding of inflation and how it really works on the level of an expert, but it's something to think about. Sorry for the off-topic conversation.
starmaster1000
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LOL! I'm not saying life owes me anything. I'm literally WORKING for something lol. "Paying my debt to society," if you will.
But a job to which I'm committing my life to (by working 40 hours for it) owes me at least a living wage. Anything to which you're committing your life to (a working week in this country) owes you stability.
Am I asking for compensation above that bracket? No.
If I'm going to work at McDonald's for 40 hours a week, I will need to make life arrangements where I can afford things within my McDonald's wage bracket (a low-cost apartment, a low-cost method of transportation, a low-cost cell phone, etc.), but if I'm working 40 hours, an entire day, for this company, at least give me enough to afford the bare minimum.
Entry level doesn't mean you're supposed to treat people like shit and pay them accordingly. I promise you that 15-year old isn't going to be working 40 hours because, guess what, they're giving 40 hours to school, so, no, I refute your entire logic.
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I live in south Orange County, CA. Talk about high COL. It's stupid. Up the road in Anaheim, home of Disneyland, there were employees picketing a while back for $15. It went to a vote with the city and it was approved but Disney may, and probably will, get out of it. (Disney isn't known to be very generous as an employer based off friends who had a kid on one of their shows years ago.)
Anyway, the people picketing were just like us - workers in entry level/low skill work. Some of them had been there 20 years and were now raising families. A few things to consider...why were they still in those positions after so long? Lack of opportunities? No. Lack of drive? Probably.
Because even if Disney is stingy they offer a lot of opportunities for training into management.
Otoh, I assume companies want low turn over, loyalty and competence but that has to have a price. What would Target (or Disney) have to lose if they offered a living wage and decent hours to those who show they are committed? Rather than seeing these jobs as throw aways, make them desirable and hard to get.
In and Out is like this in the food industry. They pay very well and it isn't easy to get in. People who work there, anecdotally, are really happy and say turn over is low.
We all know what Target is and it is sad they dont seem to value us as much as we feel is due based on a lot of loyalty I see here.
Anyway, the people picketing were just like us - workers in entry level/low skill work. Some of them had been there 20 years and were now raising families. A few things to consider...why were they still in those positions after so long? Lack of opportunities? No. Lack of drive? Probably.
Because even if Disney is stingy they offer a lot of opportunities for training into management.
Otoh, I assume companies want low turn over, loyalty and competence but that has to have a price. What would Target (or Disney) have to lose if they offered a living wage and decent hours to those who show they are committed? Rather than seeing these jobs as throw aways, make them desirable and hard to get.
In and Out is like this in the food industry. They pay very well and it isn't easy to get in. People who work there, anecdotally, are really happy and say turn over is low.
We all know what Target is and it is sad they dont seem to value us as much as we feel is due based on a lot of loyalty I see here.
Tessa120
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Minimum wage should be living wage. The intent of the wage increase in the 70s was so that a family could live on one 40 hour paycheck. A person should be able to afford food, shelter, utilities, transportation, medical and enough money to clothe their bodies on a full time job. If that's not happening then the fault is on the corporations that don't seem to realize that people need disposable income to spend in their stores and that driving wages down means there will be less money floating out there to make it into the cash registers. Blood from a turnip after all.
As far as entry level unskilled expectations, my last job was also entry level and the only real skills we needed were literacy, customer service, basic math, data entry accuracy and the ability to put up with shit from customers and managers. I didn't work as hard as I work at Target and I was making $17.50. Yeah, $17.50 to basically answer and direct phone calls, enter information into a computer, and proofread the documents that printed. Wow, hard. Yeah, there were a shit load of details and a shit load of stress, but that's pretty much what the job boiled down to.
As far as entry level unskilled expectations, my last job was also entry level and the only real skills we needed were literacy, customer service, basic math, data entry accuracy and the ability to put up with shit from customers and managers. I didn't work as hard as I work at Target and I was making $17.50. Yeah, $17.50 to basically answer and direct phone calls, enter information into a computer, and proofread the documents that printed. Wow, hard. Yeah, there were a shit load of details and a shit load of stress, but that's pretty much what the job boiled down to.
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Great post. I don’t agree with all of your points and there’s a lot to dissect and I’m on my phone so I’ll leave you with these two things...
Yes the government is too big but way more importantly... the federal reserve is consistently robbing everyone of their purchasing power. They willfully print money so that the US government can continue to spend itself into obliteration which in turn rapidly devalues the dollar.
It is extremely probable within our lifetimes that we will see an entire collapse of the US dollar because of the federal reserve and the US government’s spending. Quite frankly, I do believe every country would have told us to kick rocks with the dollar long ago if it were not for the fact that we would “give them freedom” should they ever say such a thing.
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You’re missing the whole part where you don’t have to work at McDonalds or Target for 40 hours a week. You are making a daily choice to continue doing so.
Tessa120
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But the choice to work any job, even McDonalds or Target, at full time hours should pay well enough to cover all the necessities to live on one's own.
starmaster1000
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How many hours a week should one work, according to you, to make a living?
TTGOz
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This is why I refuse to work more than thirty hours a week at Target. I get full time benefits at 32 anyways. Not worth it at all. I have my side businesses and Target has slowly become more of a side gig.
What's hilarious is this summer I tried to ask for a reduction in hours and basically got told I'm SOL. They're lucky winter was coming and my main business was gonna have to shut down due to the cold and snow until the spring, so I just accepted it.
Just so sick of being overworked in my department. I could ask for a raise and get told "Not up to me" even by the STL. I'm making plans to try applying to some other grocery stores, considering Aldis as a number one pick. Their benefits are far better and you can actually work over time, it's almost mandatory.
If Target just let us work over time, I feel like things would be much better.
It's good at least someone recognizes that. I hope to never have to witness the fall of the almighty dollar, that almost certainly means the end. We'll get bailed out by Russia or China and become their bitches. Either that or citizens decide to group together and form their own groups and create new borders within the USA. I know, I know, big conspiracy, it's fun to think about sometimes.
Why?
They start at 12 bucks an hour so their upside would be the OT and bennies?
Tessa120
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Why? How about because that was the intent of establishing a minimum wage in the first place. Originally there was also a maximum number of hours a person could work during a week's time. It was expected that businesses would give a fair day's pay to a fair day's work.
This one sentence about minimum wage law speaks volumes. It's happened before, which is why there is minimum wage laws, and it shows the government's duty is to raise the wages above what businesses would freely offer for the good of labor.
This one sentence about minimum wage law speaks volumes. It's happened before, which is why there is minimum wage laws, and it shows the government's duty is to raise the wages above what businesses would freely offer for the good of labor.
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Here's my question. If retail is "low skill" labor then why are there so many people who can't do the job? Especially with this new modernization where you balance working freight, backstocking,assisting guests, doing go backs, etc? I can't stand idiots that think any idiot can do this job. If that was the case my life and others would be so much easier at Target 😂
starmaster1000
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This! So much this.
I think it's because it is easy to slap a label like that on the work these members of the workforce do and then sell it as "any idiot can do it" in an effort to justify paying pebbles to do it.
Even in the fast food industry, arguably the most stereotypical "low skill" industry, think about how many times your burger has been fucked up even with the minimal amount of instructions you gave.
can't touch this
PhD
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@TTGOz a friend of mine works at Aldi and is about to quit because it sucks so bad. They do pay okay money but that’s about it. It’s a German owned company which means it’s run like a death camp, and no I’m not even kidding. You are expected to run register, stock the shelves, clean the coolers, take out trash and cardboard, straighten the stockroom and basically aren’t allowed to leave for the day until der Führer walks the store and confirms that everything is 10000% done. You’re there for 11+ hours and just when you’re about to leave, you hear “oh by the way, the other store at [some location 30 miles away] needs you to work a shift starting at 7am tomorrow, Auf Wiedersehn!” You “can” say no but it’s not recommended.
Let’s put it this way, you make a lot of money but you’ll be spending it all at the chiropractor and liquor store.
Let’s put it this way, you make a lot of money but you’ll be spending it all at the chiropractor and liquor store.
RightArm
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The problem with that scenario is that they didn't JUST raise the base pay. If that's all they had done then okay they'd have a right to say that. But not only did they raise the base pay, they doubled or tripled their demands on what they want done in a shift. All things being equal you really didn't raise anything.
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