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RTH10260
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#1

Post by RTH10260 »

These businesses found a way around the worker shortage: Raising wages to $15 an hour or more

Eli Rosenberg
June 10, 2021 at 12:00 p.m. GMT+2

The owners of Klavon’s Ice Cream Parlor had hit a wall.

For months, the 98-year-old confectionary in Pittsburgh couldn’t find applicants for the open positions it needed to fill ahead of warmer weather and, hopefully, sunnier times for the business after a rough year.

The job posting for scoopers — $7.25 an hour plus tips — did not produce a single application between January and March.

So owner Jacob Hanchar decided to more than double the starting wage to $15 an hour, plus tips, “just to see what would happen.”

The shop was suddenly flooded with applications. More than 1,000 piled in over the course of a week.

“It was like a dam broke,” Hanchar said. Media coverage that followed his decision soon pushed other candidates his way.



https://www.washingtonpost.com/business ... ing-wages/
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Lani
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Re: Jobs

#2

Post by Lani »

Well, duh.

I posted somewhere in a Covid economy thread about people refusing to return to work for minimum wage, especially these days when they are more likely to be abused and attacked. Maybe something good will come from the pandemic - a livable wage.

Chipotle will be paying $15/hr minimum by the end of this month.
Image You can't wait until life isn't hard anymore before you decide to be happy.
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Re: Jobs

#3

Post by KickahaOta »

One of my biggest fears coming out of the pandemic is that big employers will draw a lesson from the unexpected success of remote work: 'If our employees can do these jobs by sitting at home, we can hire people to do these jobs while sitting at home in cheaper countries.'
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#4

Post by RTH10260 »

India has not always been a success story.
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#5

Post by jez »

It's "Displacement" season. Other terms that have been used are layoffs, workforce reduction, headcount reduction, etc. It's all a way to say "fired".

Two people from our already short staffed team were let go yesterday. I now have yet another responsibility on my already full plate (admin of our SPONL sites).
My boss's boss is also resigning. She is gone on November 18 and our team is being shifted under someone else "temporarily".
There is a new guy coming in to head up our division. He'll be only 4th down from the CEO. Have no idea what is going to happen with the guy currently in that position. He's not going anywhere, that we know of. For now.

Anyway, everything that is happening is just another way to say:
RE-ORG!


As usual, I'm going to keep my head down, keep doing my job to the best of my ability, be nice to others, be helpful, learn other skills, and hope to survive.
“What is better ? to be born good or to overcome your evil nature through great effort ?”

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#6

Post by Tiredretiredlawyer »

Jez wrote:

As usual, I'm going to keep my head down, keep doing my job to the best of my ability, be nice to others, be helpful, learn other skills, and hope to survive.
Everything you learned in kindergarten. :biggrin:
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#7

Post by Danraft »

IA (Intelligent Automation) is a skill set worth learning— to increase effiency and effectiveness and maintain a place in the competitive market place.

Leveraging technology to accomplish repetitive tasks is basic toolset but one that few have.
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#8

Post by RTH10260 »

the former guy must be seething 8-)
US adds a surprisingly strong 517,000 jobs despite Fed hikes

PAUL WISEMAN
Fri, February 3, 2023 at 3:21 AM GMT+1·4 min read

WASHINGTON (AP) — America’s employers added a stunning 517,000 jobs in January, a surprisingly strong gain in the face of the Federal Reserve’s aggressive drive to slow growth and tame inflation with higher interest rates.

The unemployment rate dipped to 3.4%, the lowest level since 1969.

Friday’s government report added to the picture of a resilient labor market, with low unemployment, relatively few layoffs and many job openings even as most economists foresee a recession nearing. Though good for workers, employers’ steady demand for labor has also helped accelerate wage growth and contributed to high inflation.

But the Fed's inflation watchers might be reassured somewhat by January's wage data: Average hourly pay rose 4.4% last month from a year earlier, slower than the 4.8% year-over-year increase in December. And from December to January, wages rose 0.3%, below the 0.4% increase the previous month.

On top of the sizzling job growth it reported for January, the government on Friday also revised up its estimate of employment gains in November and December by a combined 71,000.

More Americans also entered the labor force last month. The proportion of adults who either had a job or were looking for one — the so-called labor force participation rate — ticked up to 62.4%. That was the highest level since last March, though still well below pre-pandemic levels.

January’s job growth far exceeded December’s 260,000 total and extended a streak of powerful hiring gains that raised concerns at the Fed about inflation pressures. The Fed has raised its key rate eight times since March to try to contain inflation, which hit a four-decade high last year but has slowed since then.



https://news.yahoo.com/january-may-deli ... 39943.html
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#9

Post by bill_g »


One plausible explanation for this too-good-to-be-true economy:


WaPo, Heather Long, March 4 2023

The United States is experiencing an almost “too good to be true” economy. Unemployment just dipped to its lowest level since 1969, and inflation, while still uncomfortable, is cooling off. This is not supposed to happen. According to economics textbooks, there should be a trade-off where getting inflation down leads to layoffs and rising unemployment. Federal Reserve interest-rate hikes were expected to trigger job losses and a recession. Instead, this resilient economy even shows signs of a jobs boom. How is this possible?

One explanation could be that the data is wrong. There were a lot of adjustments to the January jobs report. Government statisticians fine-tuned the numbers on population size, immigration and how many workers typically exit jobs after the summer and winter holidays. It’s likely the 517,000 job gains will be revised lower. But revisions over the past two years have overwhelmingly shown more jobs added than initially thought, and hiring in recent months is clearly strong.

Another possible factor is all the government stimulus rolled out during the pandemic is still having an impact. The stimulus checks, unemployment money and child tax credit payments — plus the fact that many people stayed home for much of the pandemic — gave Americans unprecedented savings. That cushion helped people deal with rising prices. As their savings dwindled, people have been going back to work and scaling back spending. Workers ages 25 to 54 are now basically fully back in the labor force. On top of that, infrastructure spending is a boost to industries such as construction that might have otherwise seen a slump from the Fed’s high rates.

The most plausible explanation of all is that the pandemic and subsequent recovery were so unusual that the normal rules of economics don’t apply. Demand surged for everything from toaster ovens to used cars. Supply chains could not keep up. Prices spiked. Now, there’s a right-sizing. Goods inflation has come down for most items (even for eggs) as demand has subsided. The question is whether services inflation for travel, restaurants, entertainment, insurance and deliveries will follow.

Can this economy last? Last year, big companies had stellar profits with the fattest margins since 1950. Customers were willing to pay higher prices — often over the asking price — on homes, cars and more, and executives kept raising the bar. Fed vice chair Lael Brainard has dubbed this a “price-price” spiral. Some might call it corporate greed, but the usual price competition dynamics were temporarily suspended. Many companies were able to hire more workers, raise pay and still give generous returns to investors. Now, those profit margins are coming back down and executives are eyeing the “year of efficiency.”

This looks like a return to more normal economic times. Slimmer margins, Brainard argues, could contribute to disinflation.

“We’re coming down from such a high level that it’s not like this is a dire outcome for markets, investors or the economy,” said economist Julia Coronado of MacroPolicy Perspectives.

The key is what happens to wages. For all the talk of workers having so much power, union membership reached an all-time low in 2022, and wages for most workers have not been keeping up with inflation. Companies made hefty profits because they raised prices faster than their labor and other costs.

Coronado points out that perhaps the most surprising statistic is that workers have not gained a bigger share of the economic pie. The percent of economic output that goes toward worker compensation — the so-called labor share of the economy — has been trending down for decades. When the labor market gets tight, such as the late 1990s, the labor share ticks up. With unemployment at 3.4 percent, the labor share should be going up. Instead, it has been falling the past two years. The current level of 56 percent is not only below pre-pandemic levels; it’s back to 2014 conditions. This might help explain why most companies aren’t rushing to fire workers. Labor costs are up, but not to extreme levels.

This return to normal is helped by numerous tailwinds: Gas prices are back down, China has reopened and appears to be rebounding, and immigration is picking back up, providing more workers to fill job openings. Wage growth is also slowing down as workers aren’t quitting and jumping to new roles as often. This could keep inflation on a downward trend.

Put all of this together and the story is that employment remains strong, consumption is solid and businesses are growing cautiously more optimistic. Avoiding a recession, which seemed unthinkable only a few weeks ago, could be possible.
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#10

Post by keith »

Labor Department Finds 31 Children Cleaning Meatpacking Plants
Packers Sanitation Services, a food safety contractor, hired children as young as 13 to clean dangerous equipment on overnight shifts, the department said. Several suffered chemical burns.
...
The Labor Department found that Packers employed at least 31 children, ranging in age from 13 to 17, who cleaned dangerous equipment with corrosive cleaners during overnight shifts at three slaughtering and meatpacking facilities: a Turkey Valley Farms plant in Marshall, Minn., and JBS USA plants in Grand Island, Neb., and Worthington, Minn.

Their jobs included cleaning kill floors, meat- and bone-cutting saws, grinding machines and electric knives, according to court documents. The mix of boys and girls were not fluent English speakers and were interviewed mostly in Spanish, investigators said.

The Labor Department found that several minors employed by the company, including one 13-year-old, suffered caustic chemical burns and other injuries. One 14-year-old, who worked from 11 p.m. to 5 a.m. five to six days a week, suffered injuries from chemical burns from cleaning machines used to cut meat. School records showed that the student fell asleep in class or missed class because of the job at the plant.
...
According to court documents, the Labor Department believes Packers may employ minor children under similar conditions at other plants.
Has everybody heard about the bird?
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#11

Post by keith »

Exclusive: Hyundai subsidiary has used child labor at Alabama factory
LUVERNE, Alabama, July 22 (Reuters) - A subsidiary of Hyundai Motor Co has used child labor at a plant that supplies parts for the Korean carmaker's assembly line in nearby Montgomery, Alabama, according to area police, the family of three underage workers, and eight former and current employees of the factory.

Underage workers, in some cases as young as 12, have recently worked at a metal stamping plant operated by SMART Alabama LLC, these people said. SMART, listed by Hyundai in corporate filings as a majority-owned unit, supplies parts for some of the most popular cars and SUVs built by the automaker in Montgomery, its flagship U.S. assembly plant.
...
Reuters learned of underage workers at the Hyundai-owned supplier following the brief disappearance in February of a Guatemalan migrant child from her family's home in Alabama.

The girl, who turns 14 this month, and her two brothers, aged 12 and 15, all worked at the plant earlier this year and weren't going to school, according to people familiar with their employment. Their father, Pedro Tzi, confirmed these people's account in an interview with Reuters.
...
One former worker at SMART, an adult migrant who left for another auto industry job last year, said there were around 50 underage workers between the different plant shifts, adding that he knew some of them personally. Another former adult worker at SMART, a U.S. citizen who also left the plant last year, said she worked alongside about a dozen minors on her shift.

Another former employee, Tabatha Moultry, 39, worked on SMART's assembly line for several years through 2019. Moultry said the plant had high turnover and increasingly relied on migrant workers to keep up with intense production demands. She said she remembered working with one migrant girl who "looked 11 or 12 years old."

The girl would come to work with her mother, Moultry said. When Moultry asked her real age, the girl said she was 13. "She was way too young to be working in that plant, or any plant,"
Has everybody heard about the bird?
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#12

Post by RTH10260 »

‘My name is cleared’: the US workers fighting back against union busting
Organizers say an increased unionizing drive has been met with threats and retaliation – and now the Senate wants answers

Michael Sainato
Wed 22 Mar 2023 09.00 GMT

Last year, public support for labor unions hit a high unseen since 1965 amid high-profile union campaigns at major corporations including Apple, Amazon, Starbucks, Chipotle, REI and Trader Joe’s.

This renewed interest has been accompanied by aggressive opposition from employers: threats, intimidation and what workers allege are retaliatory firings. The backlash seems to be working, but workers and their supporters are fighting back.

The tension between popularity and pushback has prompted Senator Bernie Sanders and the US Senate’s health, education, labor and pensions (Help) committee to hold recent hearings on union busting, including what is expected to be a heated hearing with recently departed Starbucks chairman Howard Schultz next Wednesday.

The Help committee hearing comes as the number of petitions for union elections at Starbucks stores has dropped from 71 a month last spring to about 10 a month recently. And, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, last year the union membership rate fell by 0.2 percentage points, to 10.1% – the lowest on record and down from nearly one in three workers during the heyday of unions back in the 1950s.

Labor experts say one of the reasons that union popularity is not translating into union membership is corporate America’s willingness to fire union organizers with few deterrents for doing so. One out of every five union election campaigns involves a claim that a worker was fired in retaliation for union organizing, according to a 2019 report by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI).



https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... etaliation
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#13

Post by MN-Skeptic »

Recovering from the Great Recession, Obama gave us continuing falling unemployment numbers. Since Fox News and the Right Wing could not attack that, they instead pointed out the decreasing labor participation rate. (Of course my argument FOR the decreasing labor participation rate was that, with the economy doing better, more parents could manage with one income so someone could be home with the children, and young folks could afford to attend college instead of working full time jobs). Anyway, apparently the labor participation rate is INCREASING under Biden. Increased salaries attract employees.

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#14

Post by RTH10260 »

I guess there is also a post-covid factor included here.
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