151–160 of 521 posts
If I stay in a place for a couple of weeks, I’d be happy to have the bedsheets and towels changed once and the room made like every 3 days at most.
I mean, most of us don’t do more than that at home. Less room cleaning would save on staff and laundry et be a net benefit for the environment.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The point is about a snowballing larger societal collapse, led by the US and UK. (But it will reach everywhere eventually.) If you and your friends are rich and dull enough, you can ostrich-hole it for a while yet. If you want to see the canary in the coal mine, try befriending someone who works in the service industry.
> If you want to see the canary in the coal mine, try befriending someone who works in the service industry. I have a couple of very close friends in the service industry. They are less well off than others I know and it’s reflected in their lives (still renting, fewer vacations), but no signs of societal collapse (have families and community relationships) there either. What am I supposed to be noticing?
In some Las Vegas hotels I no longer need to stop at a counter or stand in a line and it’s 1000x better experience. I can walk directly to my room and scan my phone. I can scan my phone for parking. I can grab extra keys at a kiosk, if I need them. I never have to talk to anyone, if I don’t want to. I also select the option not to have my room cleaned each day. I’ll ask someone in the hall for towels if I stay long e…
I would want any hotel I stay in to have mandated at least weekly hotel room cleaning, or at least weekly inspection. Too many people are sufficiently dirty that it can easily cause pest issues, as well as other damages.
Secondly hotels inside of casinos both outside of and including the strip will regularly clean rooms. They also have regular pest control services, as the rooms are high traffic and constantly occupied.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Hotels have raised hourly wages by 25% since early 2020, and employers are offering greater flexibility in scheduling. Still, workers are nowhere to be seen. I dunno, my pay sure hasn't gone up by 25% in the past 2 years.
Would you work for $16/hr with no health insurance? Hotels are notorious for not only not offering steady 40 hour employment but sending staff home if room count is low or calling people in with minimal notice.
I actually did, even if you adjust for inflation.
Its not a shortage of workers, it's a shortage of underpayable workers.
Maybe the issue is just that hotels don't want to pay enough.
Maybe there is an actual shortage. Then any single hotel can solve the shortage by paying more, but hotels in general can't.
Or maybe hotels have to rethink their business models. It's an inevitable consequence of real wage growth that labor becomes more expensive relative to goods and services. At some point, the old ways are no longer viable. Hotels can't hire as many housekeepers as before, because people are not willing to pay enough for hotel rooms. Hotels must then find ways to provide housekeeping more efficiently with less labor.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Hotels have raised hourly wages by 25% since early 2020, and employers are offering greater flexibility in scheduling. Still, workers are nowhere to be seen. I dunno, my pay sure hasn't gone up by 25% in the past 2 years.
The rate it’s gone up is a red herring. If people don’t want to take the job at the posted rate then they are underpaying. Instead of comparing if your pay has gone up 25%, ask if you’d rather take one of those jobs than yours. Because apparently that’s an option if you want. There are almost certainly miserable working conditions, bad hours, and still an overall low wage. If people are able to find better jobs, then…
Well, that's why they're going to robots I guess.
> Instead of comparing if your pay has gone up 25%, ask if you’d rather take one of those jobs than yours. Because apparently that’s an option if you want.
I worked a much worse factory job for years. I don't blame people for not wanting such a thing, but sometimes it isn't all about pay, either. You couldn't pay me to go back to my old job.
Hotels should start proposing discounts for not cleaning the room every day. If I stay in a place for a couple of weeks, I’d be happy to have the bedsheets and towels changed once and the room made like every 3 days at most. I mean, most of us don’t do more than that at home. Less room cleaning would save on staff and laundry et be a net benefit for the environment.
Hotels have, in many cases, just stopped having daily room cleaning, without offering a discount:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hotels-end-basic-amenities-no-m...
Its not a shortage of workers, it's a shortage of underpayable workers.
The solution to this in Canada seems to be to allow a lot of immigrants from poorer countries, willing to live two to a bedroom. Fast food places, Walmart, and other places are now fully staffed thanks to that policy. I know for a fact that it's the case, because in my town it's a very large demographic change from recognizable ethnicity where 5 years ago there was almost none. Unfortunately Canada is a a very expens…
This approach hasn't been good for anyone involved.
The employees typically seem quite miserable, as would be expected given their circumstances.
Economically, this approach also significantly increases demand for supply-constrained housing, health care, infrastructure, and goods. This in turn exacerbates Canada's current inflation problem, and it's made worse by these imported workers not offering any real (in the economic sense) productivity gains to help offset the increased demand.
The combination of these factors, plus cultural differences, seems to have resulted in a steep decline in the customer experience at such establishments over that period of time, too.
I now spend a small fraction of what I used to at such businesses because the experience is typically poor, at least relative to what it was in the past. I know others who have changed their spending habits, too, for the same reason.
Hotels should start proposing discounts for not cleaning the room every day. If I stay in a place for a couple of weeks, I’d be happy to have the bedsheets and towels changed once and the room made like every 3 days at most. I mean, most of us don’t do more than that at home. Less room cleaning would save on staff and laundry et be a net benefit for the environment.
Its not a shortage of workers, it's a shortage of underpayable workers.
You can't have a shortage of underpayable workers, since a shortage means that quantity supplied is less than quantity demanded at every possible price point.
What it is, is purchasers seeking government intervention in the market to artificially suppress market clearing prices.