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McDonald's Tries to Help Its Minimum Wage Workers

WFFaithful said:
Did you borrow money from your parents?
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I borrowed from a bank. But no doubt, I had built in advantages having two sound parents. I have had plenty of advantages in this life and I support the leveling of the playing field. My dad was a Federal Director (Raleigh) for HEW (HHS) and so seeing people get their rightful benefits is of utmost importance. Even Genghis Khan provided a form of social security. He recognized the needs of the common weal. Affirmative Action was something that my dad taught me was essential for our society to adopt. It was clear that certain elements would remain intractable and that the same Jim Crowesque racial nepotism would remain intact. The duration of such a program was the only question. How long would the practice be instituted.

Things are not so cut and dried in my world. The issue of minimum wage is much more complex and even two-sided at times. You and I look at a figure and say "well, clearly they can pay much more" but we have no idea what pressures the franchisee gets from corporate as relates to product pricing, program implementations,etc., --- The gals and guys who own a MCD franchise(s) do very well...they also lose plenty of hair and sleep.
 
WFFaithful said:
Did you borrow money from your parents?
Click to expand...

Faithful, a good friend of mine (a lifelong Republican and merchant banker) asks start-ups he invests in to pay first their employees 20% more than the going rate. His logic is you need good and loyal employees at the beginning. Plus, it makes it less likely they would get better offers during your ramp up and rollout period.

Paying the least you can is often very detrimental to the long-term health of your company.
 
RJKarl said:
Faithful, a good friend of mine (a lifelong Republican and merchant banker) asks start-ups he invests in to pay first their employees 20% more than the going rate. His logic is you need good and loyal employees at the beginning. Plus, it makes it less likely they would get better offers during your ramp up and rollout period.

Paying the least you can is often very detrimental to the long-term health of your company.
Click to expand...

this isn't terrible business practice.
Especially for start-ups. You want to be able to command top talent for a start-up because start-ups take a lot of brainpower and understanding to run.
Big companies like Walmart and McD have well established policies and practices that anyone with a pulse should be able to follow (which is why they wouldn't be so devastated by turnover). A start-up loses a lot of tacit knowledge if it loses an employee (even a low level one)
Each business model is different, but with mature businesses with established processes it's tough to "over pay" employees
 
My response to bacon. Point by point.
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I would argue that part of the problem is that minimum wage workers aren't more educated than they were 40 years ago and that is the problem.

--923 makes this point well, so I won't go into much detail. There was a lot more someone could do with a high school diploma 40 years ago.

What do you do about it? I'm not proposing a solution, however I personally think that you can't force a living wage on people who can't command a living wage.


What is meant by "why do we blame them"?
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You provided your own example.
 
PhDeac said:
My response to bacon. Point by point.
-----------------
I would argue that part of the problem is that minimum wage workers aren't more educated than they were 40 years ago and that is the problem.

--923 makes this point well, so I won't go into much detail. There was a lot more someone could do with a high school diploma 40 years ago.

What do you do about it? I'm not proposing a solution, however I personally think that you can't force a living wage on people who can't command a living wage.


What is meant by "why do we blame them"?
-------------

You provided your own example.
Click to expand...

To the "there was a lot someone could do 40 years ago with a high school degree" I would say, I agree to that. However, the world is more complicated and the vast majority of people need more than a high school degree and willingness to swing a hammer 40 hours a week to be considered (and paid as) a productive member of society. The world is also a lot more competitive than it was 40 years ago. 40 years ago, there was the United States and Europe and an emerging Japan. 1/3 of the world's population was mired in communism and the other 1/3 was completely 3rd world. Now that is not the case. (while the Chinese are still communist, their economy is a global market one) Now the rest of the world is pulling the lower/middle class down to it's level (because they have been willing to provide near or similar productivity/quality for less....although now that's starting to swing back the other way it seems)

Who is blamed doesn't really matter, it's a specific individual's problem as well as society as a whole's problem. Society does provide subsides (not insinuating that those subsides are a cure all by any means, just that society is partially to blame and takes some of the burden), but if you forced "living wage" pay then that job would likely go away...and although neither are optimal, I would rather have someone work a low skill job and get a partial government subsidy than not have any jobs that such a person could do and then have to subsidize him completely)

...ugh...I do have a well thought out point, but my writing today is pretty poor. Maybe I'll come back and try and put out my thoughts more clearly later (but maybe not)
 
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