Adrian_Thompson said:
In reply to volvoclearinghouse :
I feel that's a little disingenuous. People at the bottom of the employment ladder, and even more so in smaller communities where big box stores have forced smaller concerns and mom and pop shops out of business, have little choice. It's easy to say let the system define the correct pay, but that doesn't work when the government is subsidizing the business by letting them underpay. I don't want to argue, I just think you and I see the same circumstances and draw different conclusions on what they mean and how we arrived there.
I'm glad we're all having a civil conversation about such hot button issues. Go GRM Peeps!
Boiling down either of our differences to a conversation in between whatever it is we're supposed to be doing is probably missing a lot of points. I wager some of those things we see eye to eye on.
Those communities where big box stores have pushed the little concerns out of business often (though not always) got there due to, essentially, corporate welfare. Dangling tax breaks and other incentives in front of big box stores to toss up a 100,000 square foot concrete monolith looks good on the property tax ledger, but can adversely affect smaller stores. Though I will say, I worked for a couple of mom-and-pop retailers, and their pay wasn't appreciably better than I could have earned at Wal-Mart or similar.
I think there's blame enough to go around. Some people pigeon hole themselves into jobs or situations and then whine about it. I used to know a guy (haven't talked to him in about 2 years or so) who was constantly jumping from one chef job to another. One time I suggested to him he might do better finding some other line of employment. He disagreed strongly, and refused to "demean" himself to something he did not feel suited his station in life- cheffing. The guy was always living paycheck to paycheck and borrowing money. One time I offered him a paid job to help me with some yard work. He turned it down.
Of course, that's an anecdote, and there are people genuinely "job poor" through circumstances outside of their control. But the more I meet people, and talk to them, the more I feel like most people exert more control over their individual situations than they ever think to leverage- myself included. What it boils down to seems to be, people are resistant to change.
Final note: I would not necessarily be opposed to people trying to collectively bargain WalMart, et al for better wages. It wouldn't even bother me (much) if that raised the price of a gallon jug of Castrol at said WalMart a buck. And while I don't think the government ought to intervene, I also don't think WalMart should be abe to tell its employees they can't bargain collectively.
