A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017) • Hacker News Board

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#31

Post by ceejayoz » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:23 PM UTC

didgetmaster wrote: post #25

Y-bar wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the full time wage can't result in a decent living (housing, food, medical expenses, clothes, feed and clothe a kid or two, and put away a little on the side) then it clearly is too little. Edit: Check out https://livingwage.mit.edu/ for examples based on real-world data.

If the job is unskilled (i.e. you can train the next person to do it in less than one hour) and you have several people standing in line to take it if the person doing it, quits; then the current wage is clearly enough. It is just like the price of the meal. If it costs more than people are willing to pay, then it is too expensive; regardless of what you personally think it should cost.

There will always be people desperate enough to race to the bottom, but that doesn't make it a good thing for society at scale.

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#32

Post by emmet » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:24 PM UTC

tennisflyi wrote: post #6

The "heart," but the only mention of pay is $10/hour, and advancement leads to more long nights as a chef in the volatile restaurant industry? Such respect Edit: also, the lip service of the title "porter" - the electric company will surely except that as payment

You have to either be entirely detached from reality or deliberately cruel to make statements like this alongside $20,000pa.

Willing to bet the latter given Per Se was charging 5% of that salary for a single dinner.

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#33

Post by atoav » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:24 PM UTC

infecto wrote: post #21

tennisflyi wrote: post #6

The "heart," but the only mention of pay is $10/hour, and advancement leads to more long nights as a chef in the volatile restaurant industry? Such respect Edit: also, the lip service of the title "porter" - the electric company will surely except that as payment

Honest question, what should they be paid? Its purely manual labor, there is not much if anything to innovate or be creative. The output is fairly binary, clean or not clean. I am all for fair wages but how do we know if $10 is the right price or too low? Interesting how serious questions get so quickly downvoted. I am genuinely curious how you would price a dishwasher when the output is important but the work itself…

How much? Enough to live within 10 miles of the place they are working at sithout having to pinch pennies, while being able to safe something for the future.

Sure it isn't a complicated job — but without it the likes of us would not be able to enjoy going to a restaurant. And it is a job that would be both mentally and physically too exhausting for many people.

Let's stop doing as if jobs like these are not real jobs. When push comes to shove some of these jobs are way, way more essential than whatever white collar job it is the high brow people who love to reap the results of that labor are doing.

People who say dish washer isn't a respectable job are essentially saying Restaurants shouldn't exist without them being able to profit from exploitation. I am not saying this is your position, but if it is I hope you do realize that this is a anti-humanist position.

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#34

Post by Filligree » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:25 PM UTC

ndsipa_pomu wrote: post #29

I wash dishes by hand as we've got a small kitchen, but one thing I've noticed is that dishwasher machines leave a unique taste/smell that can be noticed when drinking water from washed glasses. It's so much nicer to use a glass that's been hand-washed.

Dishwashers are all designed not to 'waste water', so they don't end up fully rinsing the dishes.

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#35

Post by neilv » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:25 PM UTC

mahoho wrote: post #16

I worked part time as a dishwasher for around 6 years in middle/high school, at a restaurant with no machine, just three sinks and a huge counter. It's definitely a good way to get into the restaurant industry, but also a great way to learn if you hate working at a restaurant.

Related to the importance and underappreciated status of dishwashers...

I only sometimes washed dishes at middle school. If you wanted the cafeteria "hot lunch", but your parents didn't pay for it, you could get it that day by volunteering to wash everyone's trays, in lieu of recess.

Personally, I think this wasn't a great lesson. In the current very inequitable US environment, I support simply giving nutritious food to all kids, and choosing some other occasions to teach whatever other values. Also, it's possible to too readily "know your station in life", and endure things you really shouldn't, so I don't think kids should be conditioned to do that automatically.)

And in restaurant kitchens, I've heard in many cases the rates paid for work are dragged down because undocumented workers don't have a lot of options, and so in some sense are exploited. Which seems especially class-oriented when they're working in a pricey restaurant, serving people who probably aren't working any harder than they are.

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#36

Post by FredPret » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:25 PM UTC

Y-bar wrote: post #23

infecto wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question, what should they be paid? Its purely manual labor, there is not much if anything to innovate or be creative. The output is fairly binary, clean or not clean. I am all for fair wages but how do we know if $10 is the right price or too low? Interesting how serious questions get so quickly downvoted. I am genuinely curious how you would price a dishwasher when the output is important but the work itself…

If the full time wage can't result in a decent living (housing, food, medical expenses, clothes, feed and clothe a kid or two, and put away a little on the side) then it clearly is too little. Edit: Check out https://livingwage.mit.edu/ for examples based on real-world data.

While I agree with your sentiment, that logic doesn't hold.

If the wage for a job is too low to afford life, then we can say either the job is underpaid or the job is fairly compensated but simply not worth doing. If dishwashers quit in numbers for other jobs, dishwasher pay would have to rise if restaurants can afford it, or the restaurant industry would wither, and from an economic point of view, deservedly so.

Of course, this theory works best in a dynamic economy where people and capital can move around with a minimum amount of friction.

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#37

Post by jazzyjackson » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:26 PM UTC

ndsipa_pomu wrote: post #29

I wash dishes by hand as we've got a small kitchen, but one thing I've noticed is that dishwasher machines leave a unique taste/smell that can be noticed when drinking water from washed glasses. It's so much nicer to use a glass that's been hand-washed.

Surely this would depend on the detergent?

Still, going to put this in my stack of lifestyle choices next to film photography and vinyl records

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#38

Post by ripe » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:27 PM UTC

I know this article is about people who wash dishes (plongeur), but the machines are equally critical. A few days ago we were in line at the cafeteria in the IKEA in Stoughton, Mass., and they had paper cups and plates and bendy plastic forks because their dishwashers were "waiting for spare parts".

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#39

Post by jonhohle » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:27 PM UTC

darby_nine wrote: post #24

infecto wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honest question, what should they be paid? Its purely manual labor, there is not much if anything to innovate or be creative. The output is fairly binary, clean or not clean. I am all for fair wages but how do we know if $10 is the right price or too low? Interesting how serious questions get so quickly downvoted. I am genuinely curious how you would price a dishwasher when the output is important but the work itself…

I get paid six figures to fart in a chair and occasionally type. The idea that I'm more deserving than a dishwasher is insane. Of course I won't turn down the paycheck, but the idea that $10 is anywhere in the ballpark of what the dishwasher deserves is delusional. Certainly they deserve the paycheck more than the vast majority of the people on this forum who get paid orders of magnitude more while doing barely any w…

Can you take a person off the street and have them washing dishes competently by this afternoon? Can you take a person off the street and have them doing your job competently by this afternoon?

The fable of the plumber captures the essence of this.

Re: A dishwasher can make or break a restaurant (2017)

#40

Post by dopylitty » Wed, Aug 28, 2024, 1:27 PM UTC

didgetmaster wrote: post #25

Y-bar wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the full time wage can't result in a decent living (housing, food, medical expenses, clothes, feed and clothe a kid or two, and put away a little on the side) then it clearly is too little. Edit: Check out https://livingwage.mit.edu/ for examples based on real-world data.

If the job is unskilled (i.e. you can train the next person to do it in less than one hour) and you have several people standing in line to take it if the person doing it, quits; then the current wage is clearly enough. It is just like the price of the meal. If it costs more than people are willing to pay, then it is too expensive; regardless of what you personally think it should cost.

It doesn’t matter how easy a job is to learn. What matters is how many people are willing to do it and how important it is to society. Trash collection may be mostly driving trucks and throwing bags in the back but very few people are willing to do it and society grinds to a halt without it so those folks should be making way more than some Facebook coder who adjusts ad pixels all day.

The problem is the US economic system is so backwards it values the ad pixel pusher more than the trash collector. At least until there’s a communicable disease going around and suddenly the trash collector is recognized as an essential worker and forced to come to work while the ad pixel pusher “works” from home.