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What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

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Re: What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

#221

Post by throwaway4aday »

iamdbtoo wrote: post #160
rnikander wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So rent a room and/or don’t live in the best part of the city. That’s what I did near Boston a few years ago. My rent was well under $1000. Do people think they’re entitled to private apartments in the most expensive cities in the world?

Yeah, that's kind of how this country markets itself. Being able to afford a home and a family on a regular worker's pay is literally part of "The American Dream."

That's a very different version of the American Dream than what I've always considered it to be. Even as portrayed in movies through rose tinted glasses it's always seemed to be the conjecture that even if you start with nothing, through a lot of hard work, thrift, frugality and determination you can work your way up through the ranks and eventually achieve a good living. They generally make a big deal out of the protagonist living a hard scrabble life while they're working towards their big break.

Seeing it as being guaranteed a home and family on an average workers pay is completely detached from that narrative.

Re: What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

#222

Post by cloverich »

Spivak wrote: post #190
rnikander wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So rent a room and/or don’t live in the best part of the city. That’s what I did near Boston a few years ago. My rent was well under $1000. Do people think they’re entitled to private apartments in the most expensive cities in the world?

If your job is in that city then yeah kinda. Workers today are so entitled, demanding an entire studio apartment the audacity.

It’s been a while for me but i always remember single person apartments (even studios) being relatively more expensive than multi bedroom with roommates. Anytime I wanted to save money that was always the first place i started. In that sense i personally would consider an apartment all to yourself a relative luxury.

Re: What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

#223

Post by Tozen »

Sadly, most jobs meet the definition of "shitty". Likely only the top 20% or so of any industrialized country will have people working jobs that could be described as satisfactory and enjoyable. It is a reflection of modern societies, where a significant percentage of their populations are considered disposable trash or the majority of its citizens are dissatisfied with what they must do for a living.

Re: What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

#224

Post by unapproved4lyfe »

dumpsterlid wrote: post #153
unapproved4lyfe wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You stated it in terms of social privilege ("jumped right from their undergraduate career to making a six-figure salary in a city...") but it's just as well intellectual privilege. I have a blue collar background and high school criminal career that looks like any poor person buying $20 scratchers, but after four years working in software I was a 22 year-old making six figures also. It makes it harder to feel sympath…

"It makes it harder to feel sympathy for those struggling: Indeed, repeatedly making wrong decisions has poor outcomes. At 18 it was pretty obvious that in the most basic sense, code = money." It's not the poverty that makes it hard to relate, it's that they seem to almost live by instinct and emotion. I wish them well but don't know what's wrong in their heads or have the slightest idea of how to durably improve the…

That's why I self-deprecatingly concluded with "(aye, there's the rub)". My thinking is irredeemably worldly if not outright myopic. Then there's the futility of "setting an example" -- when I was young and poor, would I listen to or learn from someone like my older self? Doubtful. The exaggerated bravado of a Jay-Z was more meaningful, that is, fuel for meditations.

So, away from rationality and towards Romanticism? In any case, I contend that our smug, enlightened "emotionally intelligent" society wears no clothes as far as treatment of the poor is concerned. It looks a lot more emotional than intelligent.

Re: What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

#225

Post by seibelj »

Auracle wrote: post #215
bruce343434 wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"You can't complain because other people have it worse!"

You can absolutely try and make things better, but most people have very little perspective. Countless times I’ve seen people say things about how they’d never bring a child into the world because of how bad things are now. They mean global warming, Donald Trump, or whatever happens to be in the current news cycle. We’re living in the very best time to be human so far. It wasn’t long ago that the world was living und…

My favorite part about people who use that as justification for not having kids is that they will not have kids. Let them exit the gene pool and the rational people can continue to have children.

Re: What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

#226

Post by Mezzie »

ng12 wrote: post #204
lr4444lr wrote: post #144

If you are $120k a year SE and play your cards right, you can sometimes maneuver into a situation where your coworkers aren’t just competent-on-average but actively bright, sometimes brilliant people. At $35k, usually you are trying to identify the one other person in the office who also got unlucky so you can be friends with someone who isn’t getting remarried a month after their fourth divorce. This can't be unders…

This reeks. There are a lot of good, honest, hardworking people out there without Bachelor's degrees.

There's no contradiction between what he says and what you say.

My mother is a hardworking, intelligent person (good and honest? Eh...) without a college degree. She'd probably be identified as the person GP would bond with as having gotten unlucky; her parents wouldn't let her go to school for engineering since she was a girl/she had to run away due to being abused, which stuck her in low level jobs. Then she tried to get an associate's in ultrasound technology but the economy crashed and she couldn't cast her net widely enough to make use of it.

Which is its own issue: Even if you meet people who are competent in those positions, they also tend to be very cynical and pessimistic + burnt out. That type of relationship can also be poison, but at the same time the only thing keeping you sane. It's hard.

Re: What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

#227

Post by fshbbdssbbgdd »

ctoth wrote: post #209
hn_neverguess wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Amazon is not even close to bottom of the barrel. What would you define as the bottom of the barrel then? There has to be a sensible threshold that delineates between 1) "I encountered a lot of bad luck but I am motivated and want to get myself out of this situation and 2) I simply don't care. Most of the physically able that fall under 1) can get a job at an Amazon warehouse. For those in poor health, I will agree…

> The national median rent was $1,792 last month, up 17% from a year ago, according to a report from Realtor.com. Rent for studio apartments, one bedrooms and two bedrooms all saw double-digit increases over the past year[0]. [0]: https://abc7.com/rent-prices-apartments-cost-of-realtorcom/1...

Why should we expect the minimum wage to afford the median rent?

Re: What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

#228

Post by fallingknife »

bruce343434 wrote: post #194
hn_neverguess wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whoever complains about slavery in the US should look up the 996 working hour system in China (spoiler: 72 hours per week). Why compare ourselves to China and not to a place like Argentina or wherever they take mid-day naps during weekdays? Because you don't want to fall behind in the global economic race. As the world becomes increasingly interconnected, there are going to be fewer and fewer protections for the loca…

"You can't complain because other people have it worse!"

Yeah but you really can't when other people is 95% of people

Re: What does “shitty job” mean in the low-skill, low-pay world?

#230

Post by mythrwy »

dumpsterlid wrote: post #132
sandworm101 wrote: post #2

>> A meatgrinder job is a job that pays more not because there are fewer people who can do it, but because there are fewer people that will. They have insanely high turnover, because some aspect of the job is so bad that the vast majority of people who try it don’t stay. Maybe it’s long hours that never stop or maybe it’s constant on-call work. Maybe it’s an insane, stress-intensive workload you can’t begin to keep u…

> Or any law enforcement. Please don't equate healthcare workers with law enforcement. Healthcare workers have an astronomically harder job and actually make society a better place.

I have a friend who used to be a cop in Dallas. He's a dentist now.

He says he makes many times the money with much less stress. Being in law enforcement in this climate seems like a pretty rough job to me. And that's not to excuse bad law enforcement behavior (of which there is plenty) either.

"Actually make society a better place". << What do you suppose your world would look like with no enforcement of any laws?

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