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I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

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Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#231

Post by tluyben2 »

Hokusai wrote: post #218
tluyben2 wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not sure that is true though. When I was really into 'becoming a big startup' etc, I was taking lessons from almost exclusively US founders. If things fail, go bankrupt and repeat was a main point. But I was in the EU and here (outside of the UK, at least as far as I have seen in practice) bankruptcy is a big taboo and you are judged by it. Instead of it being something you at least tried but failed, it is seen…

> it is seen as a deep flaw over here and it can haunt you for a long time When a company goes bankrupt it can bring down with it smaller providers and self employed workers. If you only lose venture capital, that is not so bad as it is part of the risk/reward. Why anyone would like to do business with an entrepreneur that uses bankruptcy to move on? I guess that in-advance payments could be a solution. Bankruptcy is…

Agreed, it should not be abused, but when it is inevitable it should be possible to move on and be some kind of stigma held over you.

Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#232

Post by tluyben2 »

watwut wrote: post #224
tluyben2 wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not sure that is true though. When I was really into 'becoming a big startup' etc, I was taking lessons from almost exclusively US founders. If things fail, go bankrupt and repeat was a main point. But I was in the EU and here (outside of the UK, at least as far as I have seen in practice) bankruptcy is a big taboo and you are judged by it. Instead of it being something you at least tried but failed, it is seen…

Bankruptcy means that somebody else ends up paying for what you spent on the business attempt. It means that people and companies who provided services don't get paid. It is not no harm done who cares event. High risk businesses have a cost. Trying multiple of them and expecting others to swallow looses they did not caused sounds to me like abusing the system meant to get you out of genuine failure.

It is a last resort: the point was it should not put a permanent stigma on your head. I am not talking about people who abuse it: I am talking about doing your best and it does not work with no way out.

Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#233

Post by abakker »

fy20 wrote: post #195
abakker wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vegetables bought from contract farms (most of them) are bought by weight. This means the farmers have an incentive to over water right before harvest weigh in heavy. Even for stupid stuff like ketchup where more energy is then spent to dehydrate the water right back out.

Is there an alternative? By volume would lead to the same as well, for certain crops that may lead to waiting until crops are over ripe - less tasty - so they are bigger.

It seems like the only better alternative might be a fixed price based on count/average yield. It’s not perfect, but it seems possible that you could pay a farmer more (net of water costs) and the supplier could save money (net energy and transport costs). It wouldn’t work with all foods, but the volume of tomatoes alone could be meaningful.

Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#234

Post by watwut »

tluyben2 wrote: post #232
watwut wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bankruptcy means that somebody else ends up paying for what you spent on the business attempt. It means that people and companies who provided services don't get paid. It is not no harm done who cares event. High risk businesses have a cost. Trying multiple of them and expecting others to swallow looses they did not caused sounds to me like abusing the system meant to get you out of genuine failure.

It is a last resort: the point was it should not put a permanent stigma on your head. I am not talking about people who abuse it: I am talking about doing your best and it does not work with no way out.

> If things fail, go bankrupt and repeat was a main point.

This is not treating it as a last resort, this is "you rely on repeated bankruptcy" as a part of strategy. So they go into high risk business with expectation that someone else will pay if that fails. (Which is ok in only speculators loose money, but not ok if they end up not paying suppliers, sub-contractors etc for services.)

> Judges and lawyers here push you to keep going and avoid bankruptcy at all cost, but that seriously makes no sense in many cases which can be outside your control.

This is judges and lawyers treating bankruptcy as a last resort.

Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#235

Post by dragonwriter »

tluyben2 wrote: post #216
peakaboo wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only thing they have incommon is that they refuse to change their lives. They don't make use of their own capabilities to make changes. Specially the American culture has this idiotic thing where people are so afraid to called a failure or to be someone who quits. That's probably doing more damage than anything to yourselfs.

I am not sure that is true though. When I was really into 'becoming a big startup' etc, I was taking lessons from almost exclusively US founders. If things fail, go bankrupt and repeat was a main point. But I was in the EU and here (outside of the UK, at least as far as I have seen in practice) bankruptcy is a big taboo and you are judged by it. Instead of it being something you at least tried but failed, it is seen…

> Judges and lawyers here push you to keep going and avoid bankruptcy at all cost

Judges and lawyers probably do that very close to the extent that that is actually a requirement of the bankruptcy laws, which are intended as a last resort.

Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#236

Post by Ancapistani »

willbw wrote: post #166
bitanarch wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. Humans are inherently fragile beings with almost no redundant parts. If I fry your brain with long hours and politically hostile work environment and drive you to depression; vs. I fry your brain with long hours in physically exhausting environments. The results are the same - your brain is fried. One type of hostile work environment is not necessarily better or worse than another type of hostile work environ…

I would push back against "the results are the same". They are objectively not the same. Of course physical and mental exhaustion are both bad, but I think people would prefer to work in an office than a factory and trying to equate the two experiences is a little reductive.

> I think people would prefer to work in an office than a factory and trying to equate the two experiences is a little reductive.

Having worked for a couple of years as a commercial electrician, I would choose that in a heartbeat over “knowledge work”… if they paid the same.

Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#237

Post by vfclists »

vfclists wrote: post #107
hogFeast wrote: post #28

I used to work as an equity analyst, so have come at this problem from totally the other end. The number one problem, that I have seen no-one talk about, are certain incentives from the market (not short-termism, if someone says that they don't understand what is happening). I buy PEP at 15x earnings...I don't need a lot of growth to make that price work. Even if they grow a 10-20% over five years, I will probably ma…

Speak English

Dudes, when I say "Speak English" I mean the OP should put it in simple terms that people who are not familiar with stock and performance related earnings for management and investors can understand.

It is gobbledydook to most of us unless HN readers have a better grasp of these issues than most.

Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#238

Post by sizzle »

Ancapistani wrote: post #236
willbw wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would push back against "the results are the same". They are objectively not the same. Of course physical and mental exhaustion are both bad, but I think people would prefer to work in an office than a factory and trying to equate the two experiences is a little reductive.

> I think people would prefer to work in an office than a factory and trying to equate the two experiences is a little reductive. Having worked for a couple of years as a commercial electrician, I would choose that in a heartbeat over “knowledge work”… if they paid the same.

I heard self employed electrician is a solid paying trade?

Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#239

Post by sneak »

knuthsat wrote: post #2

Anyone knows why people decide to do this kind of time consuming work? Is the world getting hard enough that there is no alternative? Whenever I see people working really hard in other parts of the world, especially when the country is filled with other opportunities, I always wonder is it just everyone else that is raising the bar and now the standard is very time consuming work. For example, there's year long touri…

There are zillions of unfilled jobs in the US at the moment. The author of TFA says he's been at this one for a long time.

I think a lot of it is inertia and fear of the unknown.

Re: I'm a Frito-Lay Factory Worker. I Work 12-Hour Days, 7 Days a Week

#240

Post by seba_dos1 »

djohnston wrote: post #222
bitanarch wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed. Humans are inherently fragile beings with almost no redundant parts. If I fry your brain with long hours and politically hostile work environment and drive you to depression; vs. I fry your brain with long hours in physically exhausting environments. The results are the same - your brain is fried. One type of hostile work environment is not necessarily better or worse than another type of hostile work environ…

I've worked as both a manual laborer on a construction site and a software engineer at big tech corp. The burnout I get as an engineer is way better than what I felt as a laborer, I don't think most people who have done both would consider them similar.

How would you actually describe the burnout you get as an engineer? How long does it take? Have you recovered? How?

I suspect that there are many definitions of the term "burnout" being used by different people, making communication difficult.

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