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Restaurant workers quit at record rate

npr.org

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Re: Restaurant workers quit at record rate

#51

Post by jcun4128 »

namdnay wrote: post #9
yepthatsreality wrote: post #4

The restaurant industry has known the solution for a long time but everyone wants to pretend it would be too difficult. Stop the tipping guilt trip placed on the public, raise your prices 20%, and pay your employees a livable wage. The public will still show up to eat in your restaurant.

Honestly, as necessary as that is, it’s not a magic solution. People are quitting the restaurant industry in France too, despite having none of the tip silliness. It’s just that people are realizing that there are easier minimum wage jobs than working in a kitchen

hehe I escaped into tech, but I remember washing plates listening to podcasts

listening to Changelog while riding my bike at night after getting out of the factory

Re: Restaurant workers quit at record rate

#52

Post by yepthatsreality »

namdnay wrote: post #9
yepthatsreality wrote: post #4

The restaurant industry has known the solution for a long time but everyone wants to pretend it would be too difficult. Stop the tipping guilt trip placed on the public, raise your prices 20%, and pay your employees a livable wage. The public will still show up to eat in your restaurant.

Honestly, as necessary as that is, it’s not a magic solution. People are quitting the restaurant industry in France too, despite having none of the tip silliness. It’s just that people are realizing that there are easier minimum wage jobs than working in a kitchen

Sure but this goes beyond restaurants in my opinion. Look at these states that had mass migration of people during the pandemic. You will find the (big) sky-rocketing cost of living where those who are moving in on a whim are also not seeking jobs in the state. However all these businesses need employees to handle the new increase in customers. The employers aren’t raising their wages either, which is also not attracting people to work. When the lower classes are forced to move elsewhere (Outside the cities) then this problem will get worse.

Return to office might have some reverse effect but online remote employees can be one of the biggest generators of this problem.

Re: Restaurant workers quit at record rate

#54

Post by didgeoridoo »

boulos wrote: post #5

If you’re interested in the topic, I recommend the MIT living wage research [1]. They’ve got probably the most useful calculator, letting you compare multiple scenarios. [1] https://livingwage.mit.edu/

Hmm just ran this for my area (Essex County, MA) and it spat out that NO job pays enough on average to have 3 kids (required 130k, max job average 121k for “management”). This seems a bit pessimistic, as I know plenty of people with 3 kids and pretty typical jobs…

Re: Restaurant workers quit at record rate

#55

Post by maerF0x0 »

Pxtl wrote: post #37

Every time there's an SF Bay area thread, you get libertarians pointing out how the lack of enforcement against shoplifting has destroyed the ability to run stores in the area. From afar in Canada, I have no idea if this is true or not. But you can see the reflection of that in this mess - the lack of enforcement of cultural norms about being a nasty piece-of-work to waitstaff and other front-of-house jobs has raised…

as i've observed it is true in some kinds of stores like CVS/walgreens (like a shoppers drug mart in Canada). But I've never observed such behavior in, say, a Trader joes or a FF restaurant.

Re: Restaurant workers quit at record rate

#56

Post by wutbrodo »

nomrom wrote: post #15
nostromo wrote: post #6

I’m sure it has nothing to do with the government paying people to sit at home - something NPR forgot to mention in their article.

If a survival stipend competes successfully against a low-paying, high-stress, and absolutely miserable job conditions then the problem isn't the stipend, is it?

Regardless of one's opinion on the wisdom of the policy, it's still a glaring oversight in a news article about the dynamics of the labor market.

I've been a UBI supporter my entire adult life, but that doesn't mean that what's effectively a lie of omission is good for the discourse. Then again, it's hard to expect otherwise from a rag like NPR.

Re: Restaurant workers quit at record rate

#58

Post by wyager »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #27
yepthatsreality wrote: post #4

The restaurant industry has known the solution for a long time but everyone wants to pretend it would be too difficult. Stop the tipping guilt trip placed on the public, raise your prices 20%, and pay your employees a livable wage. The public will still show up to eat in your restaurant.

or automate 99% of the business and free these poor souls from a mundane existence. Also, I think we should support them w/ safety net (see basically andrew yang's platform). I don't see anyone screaming about ditch digging jobs or dishwashers saying we should "save those jobs!" . Backhoes and automatic dishwashers have freed people from meaningless work. We should do the same for everything we can. There's a stereot…

It’s not socially efficient to spend all our effort trying to automate things. This happens naturally as wages required to hire people for a given task increase and automation gets cheaper. The natural progression of the situation in the article is that wages go up, increasing the viability of automation, so you’ll get your wish (in this context) soon enough.

If we “freed” people from work with welfare, 99.9% of recipients would smoke weed and watch cartoons, not create art. It might still be preferable to having people work low-engagement jobs, but let’s not be too idealistic.

Re: Restaurant workers quit at record rate

#59

Post by leereeves »

maerF0x0 wrote: post #27
yepthatsreality wrote: post #4

The restaurant industry has known the solution for a long time but everyone wants to pretend it would be too difficult. Stop the tipping guilt trip placed on the public, raise your prices 20%, and pay your employees a livable wage. The public will still show up to eat in your restaurant.

or automate 99% of the business and free these poor souls from a mundane existence. Also, I think we should support them w/ safety net (see basically andrew yang's platform). I don't see anyone screaming about ditch digging jobs or dishwashers saying we should "save those jobs!" . Backhoes and automatic dishwashers have freed people from meaningless work. We should do the same for everything we can. There's a stereot…

> Also, I think we should support them w/ safety net (see basically andrew yang's platform).

Which raises the question of why anyone would work, if doing whatever you want and still living a comfortable life was an option.

It sounds like a lovely future, but I don't the automation exists yet to replace all the jobs.

Re: Restaurant workers quit at record rate

#60

Post by wutbrodo »

pphysch wrote: post #12
nostromo wrote: post #6

I’m sure it has nothing to do with the government paying people to sit at home - something NPR forgot to mention in their article.

If you want to go that far, you might as well mention how the "American Dream" has been dying since 2008 and took a major shock in 2020. Why work hard and bust your butt in a country and real economy that is falling apart and currently has no long-term prospects?

In what sense did the "American Dream" take a shock in 2020? Iirc, by far the greatest %-age net worth growth in 2020 was among the bottom 50%: greater than the growth in the top 10% or top 1%.
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