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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/27/2021 03:57PM by SoCalMama.

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/27/2021 03:58PM by SoCalMama.

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/27/2021 03:58PM by SoCalMama.

@SoCalMama wrote:

$1 a minute. Try it. That's my rate. Heck, try $0.50 a minute.

You apparently have a tight focus on money, money, money... well, I’m not going to get into a pissing match with an anonymous person (who may or may not be telling the truth.) It’s enough to say that I pay off half a mortgage, half a car loan, and various and sundry bills monthly with my video work and traditional mystery shop earnings. I’m happy with that.

Anyway.

SoCalMama, “no man is an island,” as Donne so elegantly wrote. The workers whom you so inelegantly denigrated as “those people” are literally the backbone of our society. If they cannot work in a global pandemic because of children or elderly parents or mental illness or a physical pre-condition, why do you care? If they’re making a bit more while collecting unemployment insurance payments, why do you care? If a restaurant hostess working 50 hours weekly makes $22.50/hour for “seating people,” why do you care? (Especially if, by your own metric, you claim to make almost triple that amount.)

“Those people” are spending their UI checks on rent, bills, groceries, clothes. (Possibly also on tattoos, nail art, and weed - I honestly don’t care.) It’s all money that is being used to keep local economies afloat.

Direct payments to unemployed American workers go straight to their cost of living - not to hedge funds, offshore tax shelters or yachts. These payments are literally keeping us afloat, because they’re quickly out and circulated in the economy.

If workers want to stay home a few more weeks or months, spend time with the kids, care for their relatives, and not jump right back into $10/hour jobs- fine with me. I’d rather my money go towards that than yet another $500B for Amazon, ConAgra, and Tesla et al., which is what we got for “relief” under the last Administration. Power to the people, and all that good stuff.

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/20/2021 02:29PM by ColoKate63.

May I tell you about something I accomplished recently? I checked average pay per work/experience/training/skill/etc. and calculated that I am worth substantially more than $60 per hour. Go me.

x amount of $ per year of each experience, skill, talent, education, training, etc. plus the minimum wage for my area = an absurd amount of money which far exceeds the reasonable value or basic fee that reflects difficulty and scope of tasks that I now perform.

Does my calculated worth correlate with my work? Not so much. It's okay. Much of my income is dependent upon place. I like where I am and can live with less money than I could earn in other situations where I do not want to be. The rest of my income is dependent upon me: I am substantially more effective and efficient with some jobs than with others, and my pay reflects these differences. Another factor is that I have not collected state or federal covid benefits. It's okay.

Just to set the record straight, the $600 per week federal addition money for unemployment ended last July, 2020. That $600 was in addition to the state unemployment amount. Every state is different in how it calculates an individual's unemployment compensation.
There was another round of federal unemployment that began at the start of 2021. That was for $300 weekly in addition to the state's unemployment. That ended sometime in March and then another round was implemented to mesh with the ending of the March round. It is $300 per week and shall end at the beginning of September.
Personally, I never believed the old Ron Reagan "Welfare Queen" baloney. We know now that "Supply Side" economics is and was an utter failure.
And, personally, after all of the bank bailouts, corporate tax benefits, tax cuts, CEO golden parachutes, stock buybacks instead of flowing back into the economy, I could care less if someone is collecting unemployment.
Like I recently read, too long have businesses gotten used to cheap, cheap labor while enriching their corporate officers and investors through their profits rather than giving their own employees a boost in living wages.
I could go on

@French Farmer wrote:

And, personally, after all of the bank bailouts, corporate tax benefits, tax cuts, CEO golden parachutes, stock buybacks instead of flowing back into the economy, I could care less if someone is collecting unemployment.

I wish that I could like this about a thousand times.

The restaurants are peeved because they can no longer hire people at sub-minimum wages. The whole premise of sub-minimum wages is that the servers will make it to at least minimum wage when tips are included. In the first place, why am I, the restaurant guest, supposed to pay the servers' wages? In the second place, with many restaurants still operating well below capacity seating, most servers would have less than half their usual tables each shift. We are not talking about people making close to minimum wage; many states have servers' wages set as low as $2.13 an hour. Until that changes, why would anyone in their right mind work their tail off for what could be as little as $17 for an 8 hour shift. Even with tips, many servers don't get close to minimum. It's not that people don't want to work, it's that they want to get paid a fair wage. In my state, servers get the regular, not servers', minimum wage. They are not sitting at home. Most restaurants here are at least 50% open, with adequate staffing. In the next state over, surveys have shown that servers are going back to work, just not at restaurants. They are going to hotels, convenience stores, retailers, etc, since they can get at least minimum wage without counting on (not always there) tips. Of course, the restaurants are hollering that no one will work because they can draw unemployment. Oh, they'll work all right, just pay them fairly.

[en.wikipedia.org]

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/20/2021 07:13PM by Candy Kane.

French Farmer opines--Personally, I never believed the old Ron Reagan "Welfare Queen" baloney.

Bob comments--For 12 months in 1959-70, I worked as an outside route salesman for a furniture store. That was work where the concept was $1 down and $1 a week, although the amounts were usually much higher. As such, the overwhelming number of my customers were on some form of public assistance. I can attest, that for my five daily routes, the term Welfare Queen was quite accurate.

French adds--We know now that "Supply Side" economics is and was an utter failure.

Bob disagrees-- I am a firm believer in the economical concept of supply and demand. Is it perfect? Absolutely not! It does, however, beat the Democratic and socialistic concept of distribution of funds. Merely note the number of posts in this forum where comments of people receiving money for not working have been condoned.

As an added note, it is quite unlikely anyone's opinion will be altered by this thread, BUT, it has been conducted in a manner of disagreement that has been respectful by all, In addition, a case could be made that Supply Side and supply and demand are not exactly the same, but they are so closely related, I view them as being synonymous.

AMEN!

@shopperbob wrote:

As an added note, it is quite unlikely anyone's opinion will be altered by this thread, BUT, it has been conducted in a manner of disagreement that has been respectful by all.

I do believe supply and demand is a valid economic fact. However, I don't believe in the "trickle down" theory of economics because, truthfully, it hasn't worked. The rich are richer and the middle class has significantly narrowed. While the term socialism has come to demonize many things in America, I believe that if we want to stop doing the same insane things and expecting a different result, we have to change things up. I'm all for a living minimum wage and healthcare and education "socialistic" programs. I also think no one should go hungry in this country. I don't consider a decent minimum wage, basic healthcare and free pre-school and community college or children being able to eat "welfare." I grew up with the term "welfare queen" but I haven't met any Who I have met are people struggling to survive on two part-time jobs of 7 and change dollars an hour.

My last paycheck job was in a retail environment. I lost count of the people who had multiple low paying jobs, each offering just under enough hours to provide benefits.

A couple of points that I made:

Supply Side Economics is not the same as Supply and Demand Economics. Ron Reagan's Supply Side Economics and Trickle Down Economics never has worked, in my opinion.

Welfare Queen? Yep, everyone has a story that they consider fact and therefore the truth. It was another one of Ron Reagan's terms that was misleading at best, but more importantly sexist and racist. My opinion is that there has been and continues to be big corporations that are the true welfare queens.
So, like i said, I could care less about some poor person eking out their pandemic endangered life with a morsel of an extra $300 of pandemic unemployment while some CEO takes home that amount in government benefits through his company's lowered taxes, TIF, etc in one hour.

I just read today that several state representatives in my state who recently voted to end the extra $300 in unemployment benefits were themselves recipients of thousands of dollars in Pandemic bail out funds. It seems hypocritical to the extreme. I used to work in a social services setting. I always told myself, "But for the grace of God, that could be me."

In school I found out that the more you learn, the better equipped you are for work, so I learned it was important to get good grades including a college degree (without debt). When it came time for me to work, I found out that if I met the requirements of my manager, I got better pay, so I tried my best to exceed the requirements. (It took a good work ethic I learned from my mother.) If I felt I was working for a manager in an industry with lowering customer demand or low relative pay, I was free to move on and at times I did. I saw others in areas where demand was low and it resulted in unemployment. I expected this was possible for me too if I wasn't able to read the "signs." Decades went by and I was able to work hard, adapt, while continuing to learn and save. I worked in an industry that was dependent upon Govt. contracts. I knew there was a history of layoffs when contracts were declining (demand was low). I remained with my last employer for over 16 yrs and heard of yet another pending layoff (the 8th since I was there). Since I saved at least 25% of my pay all these years, I was able to volunteer for a severance package and "retire" early (14 yrs before SS FRA). Moral of this story? You need to be aware of market forces, how your industry works, learn skills that employers want, and plan. Don't coast. Don't believe you can buck market forces. Don't let things just happen to you. Don't rely on Govt. handouts. Pull up your own bootstraps. You won't go hungry. You won't have to worry about a roof over your head.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2021 07:22AM by maverick1.

Bootstraps, schmootstraps.

The more I learn, the better equipped I am to be the sort of person who will buck current trends and, as respectfully as possible, decline to participate in absurd demanded behaviors. This does not make me more welcome in workplaces. It makes me less welcome in places where people who once had freedom of thought now must behave as if they have lost their senses in order to fit in or at least give the appearance of welcoming all diversities (except those that are churned out of fashion because that is how this alleged diversity thing is done now). Where are these places? They are practically ubiquitous. Alas.

It’s funny-not-funny how often we demand that workers employ their “bootstraps” and surmount incredibly difficult obstacles- but I’ve never seen a Fortune 500 company told to go back, work harder, and forego handouts by “pulling up THEIR bootstraps.”

The “bootstrap” myth is a fairy tale. It completely ignores the very real discrimination against people of color, the disabled, and women in the USA. It’s offensive during a pandemic to tell essential workers (who were sickened and killed by COVID at 3.5 times the rate of non-workers) to suck it up and move on.

I often note that the ones who employ the “pull up your bootstraps” fable are the ones who are highly privileged in our society because of their gender and/or race. It’s quite telling, how blind they can be - and how little they care for the lavish benefits being poured out to corporations and Wall Street. Hmmmmmm.

P.S. - using the term “Welfare Queen” is a racist and misogynistic trope. Just in case you have been in a bunker since 1985.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2021 02:32PM by ColoKate63.

Wow! So an expression of bootstrapping, meaning you can always better yourself, usually financially but also spiritually when you look at the self-help movement, gets turned into...discrimination and racism?

I guess if a person is "busting their ass" it's a sexist remark?

In the software development world, of which I am acquainted with, bootstrapping roughly means to create a self-sustaining system from scratch. In compiler development it is the practice of writing the compiler in the target language, then compiling the compiler with itself.

If I have an automobile kept carefully in very good condition and rarely driven, the phrase typically used is "garage queen." I guess that phrase is cancelled too?

Is the naming of ships female names no longer acceptable?

Please share the full list of acceptable use of language in 2021. I must have missed the email / memo.

Looking for logic in language is a fool’s errand. Idioms simply mean what they mean.

Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/25/2021 09:08PM by maverick1.

Bootstrapping might offend a person who has no legs, or no feet, or no known resources. They might prefer a different expression that is not a constant reminder of their situation... says the one whose back will shriek at least a few dozen more times this week before all gigs are completed... and who sometimes wears fashion booties instead of big work boots...

But I want to say this at the end of "my" day. There are eight hours left in the typically recognized day and zero hours of work (besides laundry) left in me. I did all the work I could today, froze my back, unfroze it and wished I hadn't because it then pulsed, throbbed, and ached, and decided to mouth off a bit more before angering my back when moving heavy wet laundry to the dryer. Would other IC's have picked up the hundred or so dollars that I waved to along my little route? Some of them might have done that with ease and had a little celebration here for their good fortune. This is good. They would be working within their abilities and interests. But my lesser amount of work was impactful on my back and thus on my energy levels. This is okay, too. I lived through a difficult day and will do both similar and different work tomorrow. This is good. I will have the variety I need and other people will pick up work they like-- or bonuses that they want. All is well because I met a challenge and get to anticipate a different set of work challenges tomorrow that will stretch me in some other way. It will not feel or like up, but within the context of what I now can and no longer do, I win and all is well.

If my back can stand it, I might zip up a pair of fashion booties and take on the day tomorrow! Whee! More likely, I will wear the squishy slip-ons that will accommodate swelling feet and hours of standing.

To pull oneself up by one's bootstraps is not physically possible. Just saying.

@mystery2me wrote:

To pull oneself up by one's bootstraps is not physically possible. Just saying.

Exactly so.

The term began in Dickensian England as a commentary on the impossibility of surmounting obstacles without external help. And it’s really, really sad (but not surprising) that conservatives and right-wingers have embraced the term. They literally don’t understand what they are advocating is illogical and impossible.

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/27/2021 03:59PM by SoCalMama.

Interesting information is that drug overdoses represent a clear and present danger to the population than covid - and cause death to a generally-younger population than those dying from covid. But while we have massive response to covid, very little is being done to combat drugs. Assemblyman Kevin Kiley of Rocklin CA made a big stir when he claimed on social media this week “San Francisco had twice as many drug overdose deaths as COVID deaths last year. This true state of emergency is met with political indifference if not encouragement." He's been fact-checked and it appears that San Francisco’s drug overdose deaths were 713 last year, more than double the 257 COVID-19 deaths. Something to think about.

[www.capradio.org]

Katie opines--We have SO much power and control at this moment. If we can take a big hint from the very people that we evaluate - the fast food, hospitality, retail workers of America - and refuse to accept anything below what we are worth - we can absolutely, definitely, raise our fees.

Bob comments--There are several MSCs for whom I will not accept work, this due to fees I deem unacceptable, but I disagree that what Katie states as absolute and definite would come to pass. IF is the magic word.

@shopperbob wrote:

Bob comments--There are several MSCs for whom I will not accept work, this due to fees I deem unacceptable, but I disagree that what Katie states as absolute and definite would come to pass. IF is the magic word.

It’s Kate, not “Katie.”

Although I do thank you, Bobbie, for putting this discussion back on track; it’s pretty sad when the people arguing the other side interject fentanyl, female ship names, software, their sore vertebrae (no one cares) et al. into an economic discussion about wages.

Anyway.

With supply and demand - yes, absolutely, if we went on strike - we would see about 1/4-1/3 of MSPs either raise their IC fees or fold completely. Fast food chains in my town are closing because they’re unable to staff their locations. Good. Good.

For example, in our industry, most experienced video shoppers won’t work with a certain family-owned group out of Texas (initials are S.A.) because they’ve been burned badly by their pay schedule and/or ownership. They are very very close to the edge with a client or three, and the owners are now forced to fly around the USA and do the shops themselves. I’m quite amused by that karmic turn.

That’s just one example, but I know of a handful more that cannot meet client deadlines. Without exception, they’re the slow-pay, chicken-feed companies with incompetent owners. Well... good. Good. Let them fold up shop and let the good companies that pay in a timely manner and with appropriate rates succeed.

Hobbyists don’t belong in this business. COVID is doing us a favor by weeding them out. We need to hang tough, refuse to perform work at low fee rates, and we can disrupt the industry.

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/26/2021 03:32PM by ColoKate63.

@SoCalMama wrote:

@ColoKate63 wrote:

It’s offensive during a pandemic to tell essential workers (who were sickened and killed by COVID at 3.5 times the rate of non-workers) to suck it up and move on.

Sickened maybe.
Killed? Not true.
76% of deaths in my county were people over the age of 65 years.
if you want to argue that people over 65 years still work, that's OK too.
57% of deaths were people over the age of 75 years. Not a whole lot of ESSENTIAL workers over the age of 75 years last time I checked.

Statistics are hard for some, I get it.

I’m using peer-reviewed literature (below) to compare risk and death rate for essential workers OF THE SAME AGE. ((I can’t believe I had to spell that out.)) When you compare essential workers to those who were able to WAH, significant disparities in COVID illness and death rates emerge.

These data, and many other studies worldwide, were precisely why essential workers ((see article 1)) were vaccinated in Tier Two, right after the 65+ crowd. Remember?

[jamanetwork.com]

[www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov]

Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/26/2021 04:02PM by ColoKate63.

Katie courteously responds-- Although I do thank you, Bobbie

Bob acknowledges--You are welcome, but Bobbie is actually a nick name for Roberta. Just for you, though, it shall be for Robert.

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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/27/2021 03:59PM by SoCalMama.

@ColoKate63; So where in your "statistics" do you see a counter point to SoCalMama's comment refuting, "Not a whole lot of ESSENTIAL workers over the age of 75 years last time I checked?" Maybe you missed SoCalMama's point.

@maverick1 wrote:

@ColoKate63; So where in your "statistics" do you see a counter point to SoCalMama's comment refuting, "Not a whole lot of ESSENTIAL workers over the age of 75 years last time I checked?" Maybe you missed SoCalMama's point.

You and the lab technician aren’t comprehending that you need to compare correctly matched cohorts in order to draw a conclusion. It’s useless to compare a 65-75+ senior citizen to a 42-year old grocery store clerk. That what SoCalMama is attempting to do to make her point.

The papers I cited compared like cohorts: 42-64 year old essential workers to 42-64 year old WFH (work from home) workers. Apples to apples. The conclusions were strongly indicative of the additional exposure to COVID, which brought with it a higher risk of illness and death.

If you want to look at COVID death rates for senior citizens, compare those in group living arrangements like assisted living and nursing homes to those who were able to stay home, out of an institution. It’s a incorrect comparison to match up senior citizens with younger essential workers.