Are all Restaurants Understaffed now (2021)?

[Guest]

So is cutting the unemployment a positive or negative?( rhetorical)

[Landomatic 3813]

24 minutes ago, slorch said:

So is cutting the unemployment a positive or negative?( rhetorical)

Yes

[CooterBrown 18006]

This article confirms all the reasons for the shortage are valid. There's no one reason that outweighs any of the others...new career paths, poor working conditions, poor base pay, unemployment pays better, etc.

 

'The final straw': Pandemic pushes restaurant workers over the edge
Eli Rosenberg, (c) 2021, The Washington Post
Mon, May 24, 2021

Jim Conway started working in restaurants in 1982, making $2.13 an hour, plus tips.

And though the world has changed significantly in the nearly 40 years since then, his hourly wage has not. At the Olive Garden outside of Pittsburgh where he worked when the pandemic hit last year, he was making $2.83 an hour, the minimum wage for tipped workers in Pennsylvania, plus tips.

So after being furloughed for months last spring, Conway, 64, decided to retire.

Being paid the rough equivalent of a chocolate bar an hour from the chain was little incentive for him to stick it out longer in the industry after so many years, especially with tips no longer a reliable source of income and lingering health concerns about covid-19.

"The main issue for me was safety," Conway said. "There are lots of people who don't want to participate in the old ways."

Conway is one of the millions of workers who left the restaurant industry during the pandemic and haven't come back. The industry has 1.7 million fewer jobs filled than before the pandemic, despite posting almost a million job openings in March, along with hotels, and raising pay 3.6%, an average of 58 cents an hour, in the first three months of 2021.

Restaurant chains and industry groups say a shortage of workers like Conway is slowing their recovery, as the sector tries to get back on its feet amid sinking covid cases, falling restrictions and resurgent demand in many areas around the country.

The issue has quickly become political, with Republicans blaming the labor crunch on the Biden administration's move to boost federal unemployment insurance supplement, which has been a central part of the government's response to the pandemic for most of the past year. GOP leaders and business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce say the extra unemployment insurance is a disincentive for some workers to return to work.

In interviews with The Washington Post, 10 current and former workers expressed a wide range of reasons they are or were reluctant to return to work. Some, like Conway, have left the industry or changed careers, saying they felt as if the industry was no longer worth the stress and volatility.

Others said jobs that didn't pay enough for them to make ends meet no longer felt appropriate to them. Others left after disputes with managers over issues around safety and pay and other flash points that have emerged in the past year.

All described the pandemic as an awakening, realizing that long-held concerns about the industry were valid, and compounded by the new health concerns. Forced to stop working or look for other jobs early on in the pandemic, many realized they had other options.

"The staffing issue has actually a lot more to do with the conditions that the industry was in before covid and people not wanting to go back to that, knowing what they would be facing with a pandemic on top of it," said Crystal Maher, 36, a restaurant worker in Austin who's become more active on the industry's labor issues in the past year. "People are forgetting that restaurant workers have actually experienced decades of abuse and trauma. The pandemic is just the final straw."

Tonya Breslow, the owner of Mis en Place, a restaurant staffing firm, said a huge number of restaurants she works with are dealing with shortages.

The firm recently surveyed 2,000 line cooks and back-of-the-house restaurant workers nationally and found just over a quarter, 26%, reported leaving the industry, while 41% of workers said they were still employed in the industry. That left about a third of respondents who had not gone back to work.

Of that group, most workers said they were not yet back, because they were either looking for the right opportunity, they had concerns about safety during the pandemic, or they did not plan to return to the industry.

The restaurant industry is famously volatile, home to strong personalities, tense workplaces, grinding hours and unpredictable scheduling. Issues like tip and wage theft, sexual harassment, and drug and alcohol abuse can be widespread, and there is often little in the way of formal job benefits such as health care, vacation time, sick pay or a livable minimum wage, though many workers do well in tips during flush times.

Turnover is a way of life; the average job tenure for hourly food service workers is less than two months, according to data compiled by Mis en Place.

This constant churn was affecting Jazz Salm's life even before the pandemic.

The 37-year-old had worked for Carrabba's Italian Grill, a Florida-headquartered chain, at different locations for more than 15 years, but said she had to find another job after one of the restaurants' outposts, near Miami, burned down.

She got a job at a Chili's in that area in early March of last year, but was furloughed when the pandemic shuttered the business after her first week.

It took her months to get approved for unemployment insurance in Florida, as the state's system struggled to process the flood of applications in the early months of the crisis.

By the end of summer, Salm found a job at a Walmart, after moving back in with her mother in Sarasota. But shortly after starting work there, she registered a fever during the screening the store administered to workers before they clocked in, and was sent home to quarantine. The company required a two-week, quarantine, she said, even though she had tested negative days a few days before developing the fever.

Walmart pays employees if they're sent home for failing a health screening, but Salm said she was unaware of the benefit, and thought she'd have to go two weeks without a paycheck.

She decided to quit the job and drive up the coast to go stay with a friend who had invited her to come live at her house in Upstate New York. She slept in her car along the way.

She said she tried to find a job at a restaurant but couldn't. So she started taking care of her friend's 81-year-old father-in-law, who had just returned from the hospital after receiving chemotherapy for throat cancer. The money takes care of her rent, groceries and some spending money.

She said she may return eventually to the food service industry in Florida, where restaurant owners have complained vociferously about the worker shortage, but it will take her time. She won't be fully vaccinated until mid-June, for starters. And she wonders about getting trained and going into medical caregiving full time.

"I'm trying to trust the process and hope that this all works out and there's not another spike or anything else," she said. "The restaurant industry really doesn't guarantee the money that I used to make, with this pandemic. Because if it flares up again, or God forbid something happens in the restaurant, you have to close it down, you're out of work for weeks and there's nothing you can do to make money. Other than find another job."

Allan Creasy, 39, had worked in restaurants and bars for more than two decades, most recently as a bartender at Celtic Crossing, an Irish bar in Memphis, where he was voted the city's best bartender three times over the years by readers of the city's alt-weekly newspaper, the Memphis Flyer.

Like others, Creasy said the pandemic proved to be the tipping point for him, exacerbating long-standing labor issues in the industry and drawing attention to how low his wages were: $2.13 an hour before tips - the minimum wage for tipped positions in Tennessee and at the federal level.

After three months back at the bar after the initial lockdown, Creasy decided to quit and pursue a career change.

"I didn't come back to the same job I left previously," he said. "It was very difficult to constantly have to police people about mask-wearing. It was very difficult to try to bartend and run out to the back parking lot to deliver to-go food, and to deal with Uber Eats drivers and the like, while making significantly less money than I'd been making previously."

And the pay had gotten worse - with his income dropping from about $60,000 a year around 2011 to less than $40,000 before the pandemic, he said.

"I've seen the number of people who are passionate about the restaurant industry slowly ebb away over the last 20 years," he said. "In my opinion, it's because the server's minimum wage hasn't changed. There is this belief that servers and bartenders are interchangeable."

Creasy, who has a bachelor's degree in history, has been doing fundraising and social media work for a local political action committee since. He's making about the same amount of money he did at the bar but doing something that feels closer to his heart with less risk.

"You had so many folks working in the industry because they loved it, but now so many folks found a job in a warehouse making $15 an hour, or making as much money driving for Uber Eats, all these different businesses," he said. "It's not that we're on unemployment. We did our unemployment stint, and we found something else."

Nathaniel Santiago, 20, who works at a McDonald's in the Fort Lauderdale area in Florida, said he believes the industry's low wages are playing a role.

He had to move back in with his parents last year after losing his job at a manufacturing facility, before finding work at the fast-food chain, where he said he's making $11 an hour - just $1,760 per month for full-time work, with no health care. That's about $4 an hour below what is estimated to be a living wage for a single person with no children in that area - the minimum amount calculated for a person to be able to meet basic standards of living.

He also believes unemployment insurance is playing a role in the shortage, saying he's heard from some friends and family members who say they are happy getting by with support from the government in the meantime.

"We need to pay workers $15 an hour at the moment," he said. "People want to talk about inflation or that if you pay everybody $15 an hour, everything is going to get more expensive, but it already is. Food, clothing, gasoline, rent - you name it."

Peter DeQuattro, 36, a line cook in Memphis who recently left a job because it paid less than $15 an hour, said he thinks the pandemic has changed the paradigm for low-wage workers - giving people more confidence to demand better wages.

"There is a growing movement of people, including myself, that just flat out refuse to work for somebody that isn't willing to pay a living wage," he said.

There are signs that businesses are reacting to the shortage.

Companies that pay less than $15 an hour - the amount many liberal economists and labor advocates say should be a baseline to provide people with something closer to a living wage in many areas of the country - are increasingly dangling incentives, bonuses and pay raises in front of workers in the hopes of staffing up. Pay is increasing in the industry as well: The median wage for nonmanagement restaurant and bar workers rose 70 cents an hour, to $14.50, in the past three months - a significant 5.1% jump.

Costco, Chipotle and McDonald's are among the publicly traded companies that have announced wage increases in recent weeks, and others, like Target, raised their wages in 2020 as the pandemic drew more attention to the plight of workers.

Local media outlets have been flooded with tales of the worker shortage, written mostly from the perspective of businesses, from Santa Fe to Connecticut. A brewery in Albuquerque is offering workers a free 64-ounce growler of beer after every shift; Applebees is offering free appetizers to people who apply to jobs, as it seeks to hire thousands of workers across the country.

Breslow, the owner of the staffing firm Mis en Place, knows restaurant owners who are offering bonuses as high as $3,000 to new hires, and others who are adding health insurance and 401(k) benefits to employee incentive packages.

"The country is scrambling to get that 33 percent," Breslow said, referring to those workers who have not returned to the industry. "The leverage is unreal."

Edited May 25, 2021 by CooterBrown

[horn4life 3760]

I was about to post the same article!  Gives a pretty good summary of what the market is like.  And yes extra unemployment money is a disincentive for some.  But for most it's just... why go back to a shitty job, for shitty and UNPREDICTABLE pay.  

You know your business model is fucked up when folks are looking at Walmart as a potential better option.

[Landomatic 3813]

If all the shitty restaurant workers from shitty restaurants are getting better jobs elsewhere, I guess that explains why everything else (hold times, lead times, out of stocks, customer service, etc.) has gotten so shitty these days.

[BurntOrange&White 39931]

1 minute ago, Landomatic said:

If all the shitty restaurant workers from shitty restaurants are getting better jobs elsewhere, I guess that explains why everything else (hold times, lead times, out of stocks, customer service, etc.) has gotten so shitty these days.

I'd imagine the shitty restauraunt workers are the ones sitting back collecting UE checks. Where as the non shitty ones went and found warehouse/factory jobs.

[pepper brooks 580]

we went to one fifth southern comfort the other night and the service was an epic fucking disaster.  guy had zero ambition or sense of urgency.  two fucking hours for dinner for two.  25 minutes before we were even greeted.  absurd.  things went downhill from there.  

[Gourmand 7774]

7 minutes ago, pepper brooks said:

we went to one fifth southern comfort the other night and the service was an epic fucking disaster.  guy had zero ambition or sense of urgency.  two fucking hours for dinner for two.  25 minutes before we were even greeted.  absurd.  things went downhill from there.  

could be related to this?

 

https://preview.houstonchronicle.com/dining/chris-shepherd-s-one-fifth-ends-southern-concept-16199663

[Gourmand 7774]

9 minutes ago, pepper brooks said:

25 minutes before we were even greeted.  absurd. 

For me as a boss that was probably my biggest button pusher where it could be difficult for me to not go off on the offending staff member, particularly if it was someone who needed perpetual smoke breaks or would sometimes have the head up the ass. 

I get it, shit happens and everyone makes mistakes and it most frequently happens because of change in the floor map where one server thinks the table is in another server's section. The problem is when neither one communicates to "say hey you know you have table 36 right?" and no other staff member steps in before that to touch base and communicate with the table. 

Man that shit drove me crazy, and it's easily the most infuriating thing as a customer. You're getting tipped to pay attention to people, so pay attention. 

[DonkeyCigars 144]

On 5/13/2021 at 9:01 AM, Gourmand said:

 

The managers of Austin Beerworks inadvertently waded into this debate in early May, when the company posted an online job listing about an open bartender position. The job included benefits such as health care, paid vacation and sick days, and 401k matching, which Graham says they offer to all of their employees. They received sixty applications, and every applicant with whom they scheduled an interview showed up. Noticing all the debate about unemployment on social media, Graham shared a Facebook post about their experience: “We’re seeing lots of posts about how nobody wants to work right now. Just wanted to share our experience,” he wrote, before relaying the response they’d received. “People want good work.”

A vigorous argument broke out in the comments section, which Graham says he was not expecting. “I don’t think unemployment being the competition to business is going to end well,” a user called James Morrison posted. “The end result is people who are capable of working, not working. That isn’t sustainable.” Other posters accused Graham of bragging while many local businesses were struggling to make ends meet and couldn’t offer salary increases. “I just wanted to put another data point out there,” Graham told me. “I wish I could kind of rephrase some of the things—it did come across as patting ourselves on the back.”

[Bateshorn 9927]

Former BOH here.  Let me restate something that a lot of other people who have lived the life have already stated:  It's a hard fucking job.  Most of the keyboard warriors on this board wouldn't even make it to the walk in before they started crying and quit when the first dinner rush came in.  I still hear that fucking ticket printer in my nightmares.

A lot of people who worked the life have transitioned to other work since the pandemic started.  It just cleaned out the service industry.  Moreover, FOH is a skilled position.  People don't just turn into quality servers over night, as much as I've dumped on wait staff during a smoke break in my life. It's going to take awhile for the service industry to competently staff up.

But the overwhelming aspect of the industry is has lived on laughably low wages for years.  I've worked plenty of places where ownership is vested in the customer experience and is willing to pay overtime to ensure best service, but I've also worked at places where management would dismiss you at the first instance of overtime, no matter how deep in the weeds the line was or no shows/no calls left you short handed. When Amazon or Walmart are offering $15 an hour plus bennies, my desire to sweat my balls off on the line while trying to turn hundreds of covers is going to be really low.

[luke duke 6413]

Good ones are also not working at Plucker's dealing with handsy assholes in untailored NFL jerseys, downing discounted pitchers of Bud Light that'll leave a dollar tip.
 

Hey asshole, I drink Miller Lite!

[Js1 85313]

46 minutes ago, Bateshorn said:

Former BOH here.  Let me restate something that a lot of other people who have lived the life have already stated:  It's a hard fucking job.  Most of the keyboard warriors on this board wouldn't even make it to the walk in before they started crying and quit when the first dinner rush came in.  I still hear that fucking ticket printer in my nightmares.

A lot of people who worked the life have transitioned to other work since the pandemic started.  It just cleaned out the service industry.  Moreover, FOH is a skilled position.  People don't just turn into quality servers over night, as much as I've dumped on wait staff during a smoke break in my life. It's going to take awhile for the service industry to competently staff up.

But the overwhelming aspect of the industry is has lived on laughably low wages for years.  I've worked plenty of places where ownership is vested in the customer experience and is willing to pay overtime to ensure best service, but I've also worked at places where management would dismiss you at the first instance of overtime, no matter how deep in the weeds the line was or no shows/no calls left you short handed. When Amazon or Walmart are offering $15 an hour plus bennies, my desire to sweat my balls off on the line while trying to turn hundreds of covers is going to be really low.

Tipped min wage hasn’t changed in decades but avg rent has doubled and everything costs more.  It’s a great job for high school and college students - flexible hours, cash in pocket, free food and booze after your shift while on your parents’ insurance.  But otherwise, it ain’t worth it outside of that. 

[Bateshorn 9927]

2 minutes ago, Js1 said:

Tipped min wage hasn’t changed in decades but avg rent has doubled and everything costs more.  It’s a great job for high school and college students - flexible hours, cash in pocket, free food and booze after your shift while on your parents’ insurance.  But otherwise, it ain’t worth it outside of that. 

I loved my time cooking, but the reason I left (beyond the fact that I was beginning to develop a taste for energy enhancing aspects of the business that are pretty ubiquitous) was I had reached my mid twenties and need to establish a stable career with health insurance.  And believe or not, low paid work as a staff assistant on Capitol Hill paid better.

[Knoxtnhorn 5974]

34 minutes ago, Js1 said:

Tipped min wage hasn’t changed in decades but avg rent has doubled and everything costs more.  It’s a great job for high school and college students - flexible hours, cash in pocket, free food and booze after your shift while on your parents’ insurance.  But otherwise, it ain’t worth it outside of that. 

True this.  I worked my butt off as a server for years while getting my wife and myself through college.  Despite @Trey3216  insistence that I may have been a shitty server, I did well...  but, not well enough to rely on it as any type of career.  Just like when I worked at Little Caesar's in high school, it works relative to your situation.

Edited May 26, 2021 by Knoxtnhorn

[Trey3216 15346]

15 minutes ago, Knoxtnhorn said:

True this.  I worked my butt off as a server for years while getting my wife and myself through college.  Despite @Trey3216  insistence that I may have been a shitty server, I did well...  but, not well enough to rely on it as any type of career.  Just like when I worked at Little Caesar's in high school, it works relative to your situation.

Just giving you hell  

[Gourmand 7774]

1 hour ago, Bateshorn said:

When Amazon or Walmart are offering $15 an hour plus bennies, my desire to sweat my balls off on the line while trying to turn hundreds of covers is going to be really low.

Also I think even before the pandemic hit there were a lot of qualified hard-working BOH peeps who said "fuck this" and went more into the gig economy jobs where they don't have to deal with the restaurant environment pressure cooker and the uncertainty of not knowing what each workday will bring. Is that new guy gonna show up tonight or am I gonna have to work two stations for the same pay? Does Brent have a closing dish scheduled tonight or am I gonna get stuck breaking that down as well? Did they get that A/C unit over the prep kitchen fixed yet?....

 

Edited May 26, 2021 by Gourmand

[Knoxtnhorn 5974]

18 minutes ago, Trey3216 said:

Just giving you hell  

I know.  Hence the :).  To be honest, my attitude tended to suffer when in the weeds.  You prob weren't far off with your assessment.

[MissingInAction 25042]

Being a waiter is bullshit. Its great as a student due to its flexibility but you are getting fucked be the restaurant. All the side work you do for essentially nothing, shit ass customers... etc

The pandemic forced them to find another source of revenue which isn't the soul crushing endentured labor that is food service.

[pepper brooks 580]

On 5/25/2021 at 4:31 PM, Gourmand said:

For me as a boss that was probably my biggest button pusher where it could be difficult for me to not go off on the offending staff member, particularly if it was someone who needed perpetual smoke breaks or would sometimes have the head up the ass. 

I get it, shit happens and everyone makes mistakes and it most frequently happens because of change in the floor map where one server thinks the table is in another server's section. The problem is when neither one communicates to "say hey you know you have table 36 right?" and no other staff member steps in before that to touch base and communicate with the table. 

Man that shit drove me crazy, and it's easily the most infuriating thing as a customer. You're getting tipped to pay attention to people, so pay attention. 

this guy had zero sense of urgency or really any level of engagement or ability to "read the situation".  The ender of it was the ice cold cup of coffee they brought me with dessert.  I had to get another staff member to take it away.  THey then brought be an "americano" which is not at all what i wanted which was simply the daily drip.  That just irritated the fuck outta me.  

[BurntOrange&White 39931]

2 hours ago, pepper brooks said:

this guy had zero sense of urgency or really any level of engagement or ability to "read the situation".  The ender of it was the ice cold cup of coffee they brought me with dessert.  I had to get another staff member to take it away.  THey then brought be an "americano" which is not at all what i wanted which was simply the daily drip.  That just irritated the fuck outta me.  

maybe don't order iced coffee

[Js1 85313]

I love iced coffee 

[Gourmand 7774]

4 minutes ago, Js1 said:

I love iced coffee 

I do too and I drink it like Ted Cruz drinks Diet Dr. Pepper. But pepper brooks ordered hot.

[BurntOrange&White 39931]

17 hours ago, Gourmand said:

I do too and I drink it like Ted Cruz drinks Diet Dr. Pepper. But pepper brooks ordered hot.

did he specify hot coffee? Maybe by default the establishment serves iced

[HenryJames 66045]

 

[cmontexas 3270]

The hot chicks dont need to work at Hooters anymore the onlyfans. The ugly ones Door Dash 

[horn4life 3760]

My experience has been that the folks in the service industry that I have gotten to know over the last 35 years almost all leave  the industry at some point.  A few stick with it, move up and manage restaurants.  Most eventually just tire of the hours, missing their kids, weekend activities and just being off when the majority of the population is off.  Basically in almost every instance the moves were as much or more about quality of life, than the potential for greater income.  A lot of bartenders for example took cuts in pay to make career changes, but once they left, they almost never returned.  UNLESS it was in a part time capacity, to help bridge the career change financially.

I think the best thing the restaurant industry could do to help itself is simply include tips in the price and clearly discourage tipping beyond the list price.  Simply as this takes one of the crappiest things about working in the service industry.  The unreliability of tips.  And the nearly universal underreporting tips as income to the IRS by employees.  Tips are frigging awesome when they are not reported and you are getting the premium shifts.  MANY restaurants also pool tips, which I also endorse.  I think pool tipping does basically two things.  First it gives incentive to the team to take care of all the tables, regardless of table assignment.   You fill drinks when you see an empty glass, rather than saying "fuck that table, that table's not mind."  Secondly... it allows the employees rather than the employer to pressure the weakest links to up their performance.

Overall it's going to be interesting to see how the Service industry evolves over time.

Innovations like the Hopdoddy model, where you have counter service for the ordering, but then some degree of table support by the runners.  They also provide their employees paid time off, and health care.  There team loyalty was extremely high pre-pandemic. Other innovations like self serve beer taps, wine taps etc. with a prepaid card system.  Robots as runners was one I saw on TV last week. Or no service restaurants, like Austin's Tso Delivery, which eliminates expensive real estate, and wait staff with an all delivery model.  In fact I think if you are starting a restaurant today and do NOT have a very good plan to expand your sales with efficient delivery options to expand revenue you are whistling through the graveyard.

The restaurant industry is a tough one, always has been.  Mostly because folks who try to start restaurants are often far, far too under capitalized and can barely get the doors open for a few months before needing real cash flow for survival.  It will be interesting to see how it shakes out.  Do not expect anything from the GOP other than blaming lazy potential employees because of unemployment.  Like most GOP "fixes," the ideas don't fix anything at all.  In fact the best thing the GOP might do to help restaurants is raise the minimum wage, and level the playing field.  

[CooterBrown 18006]

Get those pearls out ready to clutch…
Chipotle raises prices 4% to cover $15 minimum wage.

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/business/money-report/chipotle-hikes-prices-to-cover-the-cost-of-raising-wages/2695333/

[BurntOrange&White 39931]

1 minute ago, CooterBrown said:

Get those pearls out ready to clutch…
Chipotle raises prices 4% to cover $15 minimum wage.

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/business/money-report/chipotle-hikes-prices-to-cover-the-cost-of-raising-wages/2695333/

My average meal cost there is about $12 so that's very meh increase.

 

Can't wait to see people lose their shit over like 25-50 cents

[WBT 20562]

Will be hardly noticeable compared to their e coli and norovirus mitigation fees*

*fee is not a tip

[huge 3793]

Just another data point.

 

Had a lady tell me that $21/hr is her minimum currently because anything less than that she makes in unemployment until the extra runs out in July.

 

Client won't pay a penny over $19.

 

This is not in the restaurant industry.

 

Carry on.

 

 

[Guest]

3 hours ago, CooterBrown said:

Get those pearls out ready to clutch…
Chipotle raises prices 4% to cover $15 minimum wage.

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/business/money-report/chipotle-hikes-prices-to-cover-the-cost-of-raising-wages/2695333/

Wait.  We were told the wage increases would come from the CEO’s compensation and/ or company profits.

Edited June 9, 2021 by slorch

[jimmyjazz 45903]

8 minutes ago, slorch said:

Wait.  We were told the wage increases would come from the CEO’s compensation and/ or company profits.

I don't know who claimed CEO compensation would be large enough to give every employee of a large corporation a significant raise, but that's just lunacy.  Profits?  Possibly.

[Guest]

51 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

I don't know who claimed CEO compensation would be large enough to give every employee of a large corporation a significant raise, but that's just lunacy.  Profits?  Possibly.

C’mon…. Play along in the class hate drills.

[4th&Five 41525]

 

[The Ace of Aces 5182]

10 hours ago, CooterBrown said:

Get those pearls out ready to clutch…
Chipotle raises prices 4% to cover $15 minimum wage.

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/business/money-report/chipotle-hikes-prices-to-cover-the-cost-of-raising-wages/2695333/

Guess I’ll have to order Chipotle more often. Good on them.

[HenryJames 66045]

7 hours ago, huge said:

This is not in the restaurant industry.

So sex worker?

[Updawg 2266]

Just another data point.
 
Had a lady tell me that $21/hr is her minimum currently because anything less than that she makes in unemployment until the extra runs out in July.
 
Client won't pay a penny over $19.
 
This is not in the restaurant industry.
 
Carry on.
 
 

So is there going to be a rush of these workers looking for jobs when it ends?

[Js1 85313]

12 hours ago, CooterBrown said:

Get those pearls out ready to clutch…
Chipotle raises prices 4% to cover $15 minimum wage.

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/business/money-report/chipotle-hikes-prices-to-cover-the-cost-of-raising-wages/2695333/

Didnt they blow a hundred mill to break a bunch of leases to move the entire HQ to Orange County to accommodate the new CEO Bc he didn’t want to move? 

[Chopper 17230]

The fact that this issue became a topic of discussion, with a conclusion neatly hand-picked before the discussion even began, is a symptom of our political system being fucked up. One party/interest group pushing a narrative and now everybody else has to prove it wrong, but in the meantime it becomes accepted fact to millions of yahoos. Reality is far different and far grayer. Some people left the industry because the industry sucks. Some people moved in with their parents early in the pandemic and are being choosy about their next step. Some people went into other careers or tagged on with other employers to survive the pandemic. Then there's those who went or are going back to school, or decided to go to grad school (law school applications are up significantly for example) Maybe some loved the pay on unemployment or hated their job so much they've delayed their reentry into the workforce. When an industry in large part behaves like a bottom feeder when it comes to employees, if the crumbs get picked off before they reach them, I hardly care. Adjust and compete, or go fuck yourself.

Edited June 10, 2021 by Chopper

[Deej 76759]

Part of the problem is customers behave like bottom feeders. 

"I paid $6.99 for my heart attack platter back in 1987. How dare you ask me to pay more, now."

 

[ShaggyBevo RIP 3868]

4 hours ago, Updawg said:

So is there going to be a rush of these workers looking for jobs when it ends?

Unlikely. While I'm a couple decades removed from F&B management my personal experience was any employee that took 7 days in a row vacation, or more, was a 50/50 crap shoot to realizing how miserable they were and move on.  This is an industry where success means almost no nights or weekends with your family(why I left). My experience makes me think staffing issues are going to be longer term from missing roping in new employees to the industry for 15+ months compounded by those that have moved into warehouse/delivery jobs telling their F&B cohorts there are far less stressful jobs that pay equal or better with benefits.

It just may be that the industry is being made to lie in the bed they built.

Edited June 10, 2021 by ShaggyBevo RIP

[horn4life 3760]

Well... part of the problem is THE RESTAURANT INDUSTRY IN PARTICULAR has utilized non-citizen labor more than any other industry segment in our country other than construction.  These are low paying jobs in industries where cutting corners is an afterthought.  Restaurants are also cash businesses where it's fairly easy to pay somebody cash under the table.  Seasonal restaurants need huge increases in staffing for a few months. Often in areas where housing for workers does not exist at a price point where working for these restaurants is anything but economic suicide.  But the real problem is...

The worst thing that every happened was for shitty paid workers to have to contemplate change and moving on.  That opens the door to leaving... that terrible to decent paying but terrible work hours job.  I think that EVERY single person especially wealthy kids should work in the service industry.  It would cut down on the asshole customer quotient dramatically.

Edited June 10, 2021 by horn4life

[Chopper 17230]

13 hours ago, Js1 said:

Didnt they blow a hundred mill to break a bunch of leases to move the entire HQ to Orange County to accommodate the new CEO Bc he didn’t want to move? 

Plus substantially bumped up executive compensation. CEO's salary went from 19m to 38m.

Edited June 10, 2021 by Chopper

[Js1 85313]

13 hours ago, Deej said:

Part of the problem is customers behave like bottom feeders. 

"I paid $6.99 for my heart attack platter back in 1987. How dare you ask me to pay more, now."

 

This is also the same crowd as "When I went to college, credit hours were $10/hour and I could work full time all summer and pay for college! Fuck your loans and debt, you whiny millennials!" 

[MonkeyDoughnut 10233]

On 6/9/2021 at 7:25 AM, CooterBrown said:

Get those pearls out ready to clutch…
Chipotle raises prices 4% to cover $15 minimum wage.

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/business/money-report/chipotle-hikes-prices-to-cover-the-cost-of-raising-wages/2695333/

Still good on Chipotle, but just a note that they are not going to a $15 min wage but will now "average" $15/hr across all workers in all their restaurants.

So they are raising their average minimum wage from roughly $9/hr to $11/hr.  So based on their 4% increase for that $2 can infer roughly would cost them increase of prices of 12% to get to a $15 min wage.

 

[NeverMarryAStripper 21900]

The CEO's $18,270 per hour wage probably skews that average a little

[Aqua Buddha 14590]

Oh no!!!!  The wrong people are getting paid more:

House Republicans are blaming Democrats for the rise in Chipotle burrito prices. 

The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) issued a statement on Wednesday pointing to Chipotle's recent announcement they would raise prices on their menu products by about 4 percent – and blaming Democrats. 

“Democrats’ socialist stimulus bill caused a labor shortage and now burrito lovers everywhere are footing the bill,” NRCC spokesperson Mike Berg said in the statement. 

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/557664-house-republicans-blame-biden-for-higher-chipotle-burrito-prices

[utee94 15813]

Fast food burritos.  Serious bidness.

[DonkeyCigars 144]

Raising the minimum wage to $15 is awesome move by Chipotle. Seriously, good for them.

I do feel like if you are a progressive though, you probably see that headline and think it a noble win for the working man.

But you find out, wait, you mean they aren't going to be eating that cost and putting their money where their mouth is and sacrificing their prices? Instead they are passing that cost on to the consumer-- the working people and students who eat Chipotle? Well, that's not quite as noble.

Big business remains unscathed and unchanged, in both profits, margins and mores, and the working class consumer is footing the bill. It's essentially a consumption tax, which is why I could not care less as someone who hasn't eaten Chipotle in a decade or longer.

Good for the workers for getting more money per hour and good for the consumers who see value in paying more for the food to enable this change. This is how the system is supposed to work, imo.

Edited June 15, 2021 by DonkeyCigars