Higher wages a surprising success for Seattle restaurant

originally posted by: Mugly
a reply to: Punisher75

i think it would be worth $100
i dont understand

Purchasing power does not equal face value. Look beyond money alone and view it in terms of tangible goods. A STRONG dollar benefitting from a degree of scarcity can purchase 10 gumballs. Now instead of printing 1,000,000 dollar bills, the Fed opts to print 2.5 million to boost inflation (the government, in it's infinite wisdom, has dubbed robust inflation as a measure of a good economy) assuming the supply of gumballs remains stagnant, the price of the gumballs will go up because the dollar's purchasing power has gone down (there's 2 and half times as many dollars as there should be). Your $1 is now worth only 4 gumballs!!!

This is where the insanity of the government kicks in the propaganda machine... Rather than stating the purchasing power of the dollar has gone down, the government will state that the price/value of the gumballs has gone up! Yay! GROWTH! In reality it just gobsmacked anyone not wealthy enough to hold their wealth in tangible assets, stocks, land, etc. Schlubs like you and I, who have our money in savings accounts or live paycheck to paycheck see zero benefit and only have to deal with a weekly grocery bill that keeps going higher and higher to cover the inflationary loss in the dollar's purchasing power.

originally posted by: EternalSolace
a reply to: MystikMushroom

Before we colonize space, we have to be able to manufacture spacecraft in orbit.

That said, we need space stations and space docks that are manufacturing capable. That would be an incredible job source that would never dry up.

Yep, we might create a ton of jobs by becoming the world leader in space infrastructure.

originally posted by: Chrisfishenstein
a reply to: EternalSolace

You know instead of making laws causing massive inflation, why don't businesses just pay their employees a freaking reasonable rate? Oh sorry, the CEO won't get a 14 billion dollar bonus at the end of the year....Only 6 billion....That would suck!

Something to consider:

99.7% of all businesses in the US are consider "small businesses". That is less than 500 employees, and likely an LLC or something (which may have "corporate officers" listed, but not a single set of board minutes because there really is no "CEO" sitting on top of the pile)

www.sbecouncil.org...

In 2011, according to U.S. Census Bureau data, there were 5.68 million employer firms in the United States. Firms with fewer than 500 workers accounted for 99.7 percent of those businesses, and businesses with less than 20 workers made up 89.8 percent. Add in the number of nonemployer firms – there were 22.7 million in 2012 – and the share of U.S. businesses with less than 500 workers increases to 99.9 percent, and firms with less than 20 workers increases to 98 percent.

Yes, you read that correctly. 9 out of every 10 businesses in the US have less than 20 employees.

Don't let the class warfare nonsense actually get to you. Its a bunch of lies. If you want to go after the megacorps, then go after the megacorps. But attacking the other 99.7% at the same time is like removing a splinter by cutting off your arm.

a reply to: burdman30ott6

Wealthy will tell you that liquidity rots in the bank. Your cash rots every moment you have it. So you have to spend it as fast as you get it, and keep low cash reserves.

What you are talking about is the exact same thing.

And its why businesses that don't grow are considered to be failures. Growth means you were able to retain the value of your cash, at the very least.

The wealthy never have cash in hand. On a side note: this is why they are notoriously bad tippers.

the wages for resturants have always been low and compensated bye tips so really all i see hear is "price includes tip"

and all the other workers benifit idk if a dishwasher deserves 15 a hr but the people who make the food do

that is unless u think ur 30$ tbone dinner should be cooked bye a someone making minimum wage and dosent know jack about cooking

dinning out is a not nessesisary and not on par with retail shops

u can get anyone with 1/2 a brain to work a register or even drop frys take that same guy and put him on the cooks line see how he dose or even toss his in the dishpit iv seen it alot and almost every single persion comeing from any job other than cooking cant make it in a kitchen

15 is fair people in the back and id even say abit low
if u think otherwise go to some low end dinner enjoy ur nuked steak and what minimum wage food tast like

all the food that comes in the back is the exact same companys deliver the same product
its the people working that make the food tast good
if that was something you could get with hireing minimum wage worker they would

my job we have 100s of apps for servers and 100s for washing dishes on avg 10 for cooks and maby 1 a month for prepcook

we lose 1 dishwasher every 3 months avg thats the position u get with no exp and maby 10% make it

every resturant should go to something like this there just spreading tips out to everyone

when you have a good meal what matters most the food or the server something tells me no matter how good they where and how much they bent over backwards for u it wont make up for a pile of tastless slop

a reply to: bigfatfurrytexan

Yes, that was one area of thought in which I had to change my whole way of thinking when I started managing projects. At the onset of a project, you commit to a profit margin, say 10%. In the "normal" world of middle class personal finance, a "loss" means you actually lost money. In other words "Well crap, I bought this antique paperweight for $20 thinking I could sell it for $25 and the best offer I got was $15... I just lost $5!" In the business world, you lost $10 because you had planned for a $5 profit above what you put into it.

I see it on the boards often, a lack of understanding related to business expenditures and such. I've explained it often, but it doesn't fit the mental model of the people who fail to understand things like overhead rates and profit margins.

The business has to pay increased payroll tax on top of the wages, I think smaller towns the strain would be way worse the profits are already low.

“Washington Restaurant Association’s Anthony Anton puts it this way: “It’s not a political problem; it’s a math problem.”

“He estimates that a common budget breakdown among sustaining Seattle restaurants so far has been the following: 36 percent of funds are devoted to labor, 30 percent to food costs and 30 percent go to everything else (all other operational costs). The remaining 4 percent has been the profit margin, and as a result, in a $700,000 restaurant, he estimates that the average restauranteur in Seattle has been making $28,000 a year.

“With the minimum wage spike, however, he says that if restaurant owners made no changes, the labor cost in quick service restaurants would rise to 42 percent and in full service restaurants to 47 percent.”

shiftwa.org...

Raising the minimum wage to $10.10 or to $9.00. The report concludes that there are distinct trade-offs. Under the $10.10 scenario, there would likely be a reduction of about 500,000 workers across the labor market, as businesses shed jobs, but about 16.5 million low-wage workers would see substantial gains in their earnings in an average week. Under the $9.00 scenario, the labor force would see a reduction of 100,000 jobs, but an estimated 7.6 million low-wage workers would see a boost in their weekly earnings. - See more at: journalistsresource.org...

a reply to: EternalSolace

This is what happens when all their friends are given part time, laid off, or given less work hours, that specific restaurant obviously was a favorite for the locals and the workers started working harder for their jobs.
I have worked in the food industry for over 10 years, all my working life pretty much until the last 2 years. I know how it works.
In the big cities, the highest paid workers are actually the dish washers believe it or not, they work long hours, usually paid between 15- 18 dollars an hour and are fed like a king, bus boys, the guy who makes salads all day have less than half the job the dish washer has, I do not agree for them making as much as them.

a reply to: markovian

i dont need an executive chef to cook my food.
im pretty sure the dishwashers bust ass just like the wait staff. i still dont think that work warrants 15 an hour.

as far as tips go, i dont understand why i am expected to tip more if my meal costs more.

it makes zero sense to me.

if my wife and i go out and we both order grilled cheese, fries and a soda, the tip expected should be the same as if we ordered a porterhouse, baked potato and a soda.

i have never been able to wrap my head around that logic.

my waiter wants/expects more for a tip if my food costs more????? i really dont think so.

i have issues with minimum wage being raised to $15 an hour.
im not saying minimum shouldnt be raised at all but $15 is crazy.

i can not see the justification in paying no/low skilled and entry level workers that much.

i will never be on board with an 18 year old that just graduated and has no job skills making as much or near as much as people in the trades. people with skills that work in dangerous environments.
people that operate heavy equipment and deal with chemicals and such...

because life is hard? because # is expensive?
they should just be handed the wage?????

what happened to earning it?

i say instead of being handed the wages, people need to learn how to budget and live within their means.
that goes a long way to helping their situation.

i can not and will not agree with this near 100% wage increase for people that have very little skills and work jobs that require little to no skills.

all this talk about the power of the dollar. how the dollar is worth less when there are more floating around.
use that same logic for entry level workers.
lets use the fry cooks at mcdonalds.

damn near anyone can do that job. 16 year olds with no experience do it.
65 year old retirees do it
friggin mentally handicapped/slow people can do it

the job is not worth that much because so many people can do it and those jobs are always available. all you have to do is show up.
how come people do not understand that?

every single person that works at my company can walk into a mcdonalds job and do the work with 5 minutes of training.
im thinking not that many mcdonalds could do any of the jobs at my company(shy of the cleaning lady) with weeks of training.
its just not going to happen and for those reasons i do not agree with the wage hike.
i seriously doubt anything will change my mind on this.

the 'living wage' and # is expensive and everyone deserves it argument certainly does not hold water for me

originally posted by: strongfp

In the big cities, the highest paid workers are actually the dish washers believe it or not, they work long hours, usually paid between 15- 18 dollars an hour and are fed like a king, bus boys, the guy who makes salads all day have less than half the job the dish washer has, I do not agree for them making as much as them.

washing dishes is definitely bust ass work. many hours standing up...moving at a fast clip.

what about the people in manufacturing? machinists. machine operators? tradesman?
these are skilled trades.
why should a dishwasher make as much or near as much as a machinist?
it takes skill to be an efficient machinist.
dish washing???
not so much

a reply to: truthseeker84

I dunno. I mean, you sound like a druggie.

At one time, I dual majored in physics and philosophy because, you know.... that's what gets me off. I could give rat one what other people make, so long as I can afford what I need. Servers making 80K / year? Sounds like a nice place. I'd like to try it sometime, if I find myself in Seattle.

a reply to: Mugly

I'm about to go off topic from my OP, but I think we're already so far off topic, it doesn't matter at this point.

When I hear about how one person is worth so much more than someone else, and one person shouldn't have to work as hard as this person, and I do this and this and that person only does this I should make more, it makes me sick.

That entire argument boils down to vanity, greed, and sheer apathy towards others.

I don't care whether you're a Mcdonalds fry cook, or the world's best neurosurgeon, you're still a human. And every damn one of us should be afforded the means to own property and a home, and put enough food in it to take care of a family.

No, we all don't need 55" curved LED TV's, or five million dollar yachts, or a $500,000 dollar home, or a $30,000 dollar car. If you want all that stuff, sure be a doctor or an engineer, or a machinest.

But come on people, are we really that full of ourselves to where people have to make the choice to pay rent or buy food, or let the electricity get cut off?

We're past that point as a civilization. What we aren't past, is our damn incessant need to have more than everyone else.

Look. Let's be honest.

If your not an engineer or a doctor you don't deserve to eat or have a roof over your head. Share a toilet with 15 people scum. Now go make me a fabulous dinner or I'll complain that your not working hard enough to live on the streets you need to be starved too.

Humph. I didn't like my service now I'm not tipping.

originally posted by: onequestion
Look. Let's be honest.

If your not an engineer or a doctor you don't deserve to eat or have a roof over your head. Share a toilet with 15 people scum. Now go make me a fabulous dinner or I'll complain that your not working hard enough to live on the streets you need to be starved too.

Humph. I didn't like my service now I'm not tipping.

That's what I see. I'm flat out calling it like it is now... it's modern day serfdom. And people are clinging to it because if so and so didn't do as much as I did, they don't deserve a life. Let's reimplement debtors prisons too. And while we're at it, let's round up all the mcdonalds cooks and garbage workers because, well, they're just a drain on society. They aren't worth anything anyway.

That's what people are thinking, they're just too afraid to say it.

a reply to: EternalSolace

They are right.

These low life losers, I could have robots making my French fries.

Round them up and put them in FEMA camps! He'll put them in Dodgers stadium and napalm them or drop agent orange!

You know what we could start doing... We could have a new colosseum built and have a lottery, every week we pull 2 people who have jobs that are below me and have them battle to the death. We could even go hunger games on these losers!

What do you say!!????

Think about the PPV money we could make!!! These people are already worthless! Who cares!

originally posted by: sirlancelot
a reply to: Mawiss

WOW must be nice to have that kind of discretionary income! What if EVERYTHING you buy cost 20% more? Add that up!

Lets play a game! How many places do you frequent each month that have presumably sub $15 per hours workers?

All restaurants, coffee shops, clothing stores, grocery stores, dept stores, and virtually every other business you buy goods or services from.

Now in San Fran where people are already paid above the norm it wont affect as many but what about powdunk, Indiana or Drizzle, Allabama. Pay everyone $15 bucks and hour across the country and the fit will hit the shan!

Hey now!!!!

There isn't a Podunk in Indiana thank you very much!!!

In fact Indiana has one of the best economies in the nation.

Bad example on your part.

The next time you try to down talk a state do some research, we are leading the nation in many sectors, and have a state government that hasn't been in debt in a decade.

Low crime very high job creation, at the top of the list in IT industries,....

Just saying, very bad example.

Try Fargo north Dakota next time, then you would be accurate

originally posted by: EternalSolace

When I hear about how one person is worth so much more than someone else, and one person shouldn't have to work as hard as this person, and I do this and this and that person only does this I should make more, it makes me sick.

That entire argument boils down to vanity, greed, and sheer apathy towards others.

I don't care whether you're a Mcdonalds fry cook, or the world's best neurosurgeon, you're still a human. And every damn one of us should be afforded the means to own property and a home, and put enough food in it to take care of a family.

this is the real world. not some fantasy.
the more skills you have, the more money you can earn. this is nothing new.

you call it vanity and greed.
i call it a sense of entitlement to the entry level, no skill workers.

the arguments are all getting tiring.

people can make enough money to support a family and pay the bills. you just cant do it at mcdonalds.
if youre a single person then 32 hours as a fry cool might do it but if you have people to feed then it probably is not going to do it.
so, take some responsibility and go out there and get the skills to get a better job that pays higher wages.
if youre 18 and can barely scrape by at your mcdonalds job then it probably is not the best idea to be having kids.
its called personal responsibility and these days people have none.

all the arguments hold no water for me...
but they dont have a car. there are no other jobs in their area. and on and on

well then take a bus. ride a bike. save your money for a year of working fast food and move to an area with some jobs.

people need to take some responsibility for themselves and quit bitching and expecting wages to be handed to them.

i was on another board a year or so ago and this same argument popped up.
some fast food workers were in the news bitching about only getting 30 hours a week and how they cant make it on that. then one of the guys being interviewed said he requested more hours and when he got them he bitched about that too.
he was bitching about having to work in the evening and on a saturday.
it was unreal.

i also do not buy into the whole argument of there are no jobs and all the manufacturing is gone.
im sure some areas are pretty thin on the jobs.
in my experience though, in my area, what i see is plenty of jobs available but people dont want to work them.
i see it all the time. i see people getting hired and quitting after a day or a week cause they cant handle it.

ive seen guys that are laid off and they collect unemployment at a percentage of their wages. after being laid off for so long it is required that you look for work. people fudge all that too.
they bitch about only making a percentage of their wages but then dont go out and look for other work cause they will lose their unemployment.

people always talk about the unemployment rates. i know there are some that have a hard time finding a job.
there are also some that can not hold a job and others that dont even look for a job.
those people factor into unemployment numbers too.

temp services around here hire like crazy. there are lots of manufacturing jobs available though them. they dont pay fantastic but it sure is over minimum wage and fast food wages.
people turn those jobs down too.
dont want to work 12 hour days. dont want to work 3rd shift. dont want to work swing shifts. etc etc

people must not be that bad off if they have the luxury of turning jobs down like that.

you know how many people cant find work or lose their job because of failed drug tests.
personal opinions about the use and legalities of MJ aside. the fact is it is illegal(right or wrong) and 99% of employers do pre employment screens(right or wrong).
a great deal in the manufacturing industry do randoms and if people are injured at work.
it is insane the amount of people that cant get through a drug test.
so, they would rather smoke dope than have steady work?
you cant tell me it does not happen cause i see it all the time.

just a couple of examples from my last employer.

dude named matt was running the floor sweeper. backed into a pillar and broke the glass out of it. company policy is to drug test on the spot. failed. now he is unemployed.
his fault

a dude named tony that ran one of the saws got called in for a random. he smoked all the time and he declined the test. company policy is to treat it like a failed test. unemployed.
his fault.

my younger brother worked there as well. got laid off. about 2 months later they called him back. had to retake a pre employment test. failed. unemployed
his fault

so again, while i know some people struggle with finding work, i also know for a fact that thee are high numbers of people out there that can not get work or can not keep work for reasons that are entirely their fault.

a reply to: EternalSolace

you guys talk with so much drama.
i never said they dont deserve a life. i never said they dont deserve a roof. i never said they should share a toilet with 15 people.
what i am saying is mcdonalds does not warrant 15 an hour.
what i am saying is people should learn to live within their means and budget their money.
what i am saying is people should gain some skills and/or look for better work



im sure you will blow right past my examples of people losing work or refusing work but whatever.
keep being dramatic...

a reply to: Mugly

Just curious... Based on information from earlier in one of the threads based on the same topic having the same discussion...


If half of the 74 million workers this would affect went out and gained those skills, A what sector of the economy could handle tens of millions of applicants and B based in our understanding of supply and demand what would fhF do to the value of the work being done in those sectors of the economy?

Would that just make whatever sector of the economy they decide to enter be the next Macdonalds job?

Just curious that's all.

originally posted by: onequestion

originally posted by: Edumakated
a reply to: EternalSolace

It is isolated but it does illustrate how inflation would kick in with higher prices. So imagine all business in the area raising their prices by 20% or more. So while these employees are earning a higher wage, their cost living also increases so they wind up back where they were before.

The prices went up 20% and the employees salary more than doubled.

See how this works?

I hate it when peoples lives get better!!

I know right, now I can't ridicule them for being poor, because now they can actually afford to participate in the economy.

This is bs I tell you!!!!