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The Job Market Bait-and-Switch (lemmy.zip)
submitted 11 months ago by to c/memes@lemmy.world
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[–] 9 points 11 months ago (9 children)

2021 seems off too since it's in the middle of COVID. I can't think of a better quote though.

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  • [–] 41 points 11 months ago (8 children)

    I think it's accurate for late-2021

    People used the pandemic to up-skill, or otherwise find a better job, so when things started re-opening in 2021, most retail and service industry places had a very hard time filling roles

    Story time

    In 2019, just before the pandemic, a friend of mine worked at a gas station for years as the assistant manager. He loved it. Some responsibility without having all the responsibility. Lots of overtime, enough money to live off in a LCOL area. He was making something like $14.75 an hour. The store manager bumped him up to $15.75/hour, since he was doing the work of two people, showed up on time and sober, and was generally a much better employee than a gas station has any right to have

    After he had already gotten his raise, corporate went back to his manager and said no (a decision by the current head of the company). Corporate rolled back the pay increase. According to them, he was already the highest paid assistant manager in the chain (~20 stores in the midwest). They wouldn't approve the pay increase, even though employee pay is generally at the discretion of the store manager

    He started looking for a new job the next day. COVID happened shortly after that and upended the job market. He got a job as the equivalent to an assistant manager at a warehouse making $27.00/hour, with much better hours (generally 8:30-5:00), and better benefits. The gas station had to hire 2 assistant managers to replace him. They also started at $16.00, even more than the raise that corporate had rolled back

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  • [–] 29 points 11 months ago (2 children)

    This is a problem that trickled out of some other vocations. The general consensus in my line of work for the better part of 15 years has been if you want a raise find a new job. It’s been really weird that places don’t want to keep institutional knowledge or are apparently willing to pay more for fresh faces.

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  • [–] 11 points 11 months ago* (2 children)

    I'm feeling the well-deserved smug on behalf of that guy. I once quit a job that refused to pay me overtime after a year of working for them as the sole employee/manager of the shop. It took two employees and both owners being there full-time to replace me and they still went out of business. I didn't even do anything special when I worked there, just had genuine interactions with the customers so they came back, and made them feel confident in and happy with their purchases. Guess they couldn't do that.

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  • [–] 2 points 11 months ago (1 child)

    a job that refused to pay me overtime after a year of working for them as the sole employee/manager of the shop.

    Wow, like they would force you to work just under the limit to qualify for overtime, or wouldn't pay overtime owed? Because that's straight up wage theft!

    I notice businesses that try to be "savvy" by taking shortcuts and skirting labor laws tend to collapse themselves once they run out of employees that are way too good for them and won't put up with it anymore.

    Glad you escaped.

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  • [–] 2 points 11 months ago

    The original agreement was that I'd get at least 40 hrs/wk instead of 20 (bc they'd hire another employee to avoid paying overtime) and then after a year I could get overtime. I genuinely loved that job and all the customers thought I was the owner. They just refused to come back after I quit so the shop failed. I got my regular wage for anything over 40 hrs, just no overtime, so it was still better than salary ig.

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  • [–] 9 points 11 months ago (1 child)

    God, that warms my heart

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  • [–] 10 points 11 months ago

    Right? It's one of my favorite anecdotes to bring out whenever talking about out-of-touch boomers

    It works on a few topics too. Valuing your employees, the cost of turnover, and how "unskilled" labor is mostly a myth. I didn't really mention it in the original comment, but the reason they had to hire 2 people to replace him was because there was so much to learn

    The gas station had an attached car wash. My friend was able to run and fix any issues in either the store or the car wash. Being able to fix a fountain machine, ice machine, register issues, etc. are relatively easy on their own, but stack them up and it becomes quite a bit of training for a new assistant manager to learn on top of normal management duties like operating the safe, reviewing cameras, doing the books, etc.

    The car wash was at least as much work since it constantly broke down. Have to basically become a mechanic to keep it running. You also have to learn a lot of risk management. Plenty of dumb people ignore the signs saying to turn your car in neutral, or they accidentally put it in reverse and back into the very expensive door that closed behind them

    Hence they had to hire two different people

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