Wow. Just wow.

[Doktor Howl]

 

In what appears to have been a gesture of goodwill gone haywire, McDonald's recently teamed up with Visa to create a financial planning site for its low-pay workforce. Unfortunately, whoever wrote the thing seems to have been literally incapable of imagining of how a fast food employee could survive on a minimum wage income. As ThinkProgress and other outlets have reported, the site includes a sample budget that, among other laughable assumptions, presumes that workers will have a second job.

As Jim Cook at Irregular Times notes, the $1,105 figure up top is roughly what the average McDonald's cashier earning $7.72 an hour would take home each month after payroll taxes, if they worked 40 hours a week. So this budget applies to someone just about working two full-time jobs at normal fast-food pay. (The federal minimum wage is just $7.25 an hour, by the way, but 19 states and DC set theirs higher).

A few of the other ridiculous conceits here: This hypothetical worker doesn't pay a heating bill. I guess some utilities are included in their $600 a month rent? (At the end of 2012, average rent in the U.S. was $1,048). Gas and groceries are bundled into $27 a day spending money. And this individual apparently has access to $20 a month healthcare. McDonald's, for its part, charges employees $12.58 a week for the company's most basic health plan. Well, that's if they've been with the company for a year. Otherwise, it's $14.

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/07/mcdonalds-cant-figure-out-how-its-workers-survive-on-minimum-wage/277845/

[Cain]

I wonder if they'll overcome the cognitive dissonance and eventually realise how badly they're paying their workforce, or whether they'll keep on repressing it with more and more outlandish suggestions and caveats.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

I wonder if they'll overcome the cognitive dissonance and eventually realise how badly they're paying their workforce, or whether they'll keep on repressing it with more and more outlandish suggestions and caveats.

"Why should we give you more money, don't you have a second job?"

[Doktor Howl]

I wonder if they'll overcome the cognitive dissonance and eventually realise how badly they're paying their workforce, or whether they'll keep on repressing it with more and more outlandish suggestions and caveats.

I was just mentioning to Nigel today that America has become indistinguishable from England under King Stephen.

[Cain]

Why should we pay you at all?  If you have a second job, you're doing fine, in this economy.  In fact, you should donate some of your pay to us, for training costs and uniforms.  Not to mention the on hand, practical experience of working for a prime leader in the food services industry.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

Also, I can't remember the time I had a $27 grocery bill for a week's worth, let alone a days worth, of food.

[Nephew Twiddleton]

Why should we pay you at all?  If you have a second job, you're doing fine, in this economy.  In fact, you should donate some of your pay to us, for training costs and uniforms.  Not to mention the on hand, practical experience of working for a prime leader in the food services industry.

[Cain]

I wonder if they'll overcome the cognitive dissonance and eventually realise how badly they're paying their workforce, or whether they'll keep on repressing it with more and more outlandish suggestions and caveats.

I was just mentioning to Nigel today that America has become indistinguishable from England under King Stephen.

Don't worry - apart from better roads and worse teeth, England today is indistinguishable from England under King Stephen.

[Cardinal Pizza Deliverance.]

Fucking A, Cain. That hands-on experience line? I've heard that from jobs before. Heh.

[Anna Mae Bollocks]

I wonder if they'll overcome the cognitive dissonance and eventually realise how badly they're paying their workforce, or whether they'll keep on repressing it with more and more outlandish suggestions and caveats.

My money's on "keep on repressing it with more and more outlandish suggestions and caveats".

[Left]

I wonder if they'll overcome the cognitive dissonance and eventually realise how badly they're paying their workforce, or whether they'll keep on repressing it with more and more outlandish suggestions and caveats.

Corporations are not ethically-based group entities.

[P3nT4gR4m]

Corporate ethics: They're just like normal, run of the mill, ethics only much more non-existent

[Junkenstein]

Why should we pay you at all?  If you have a second job, you're doing fine, in this economy.  In fact, you should donate some of your pay to us, for training costs and uniforms.  Not to mention the on hand, practical experience of working for a prime leader in the food services industry.

Would it be worth mentioning the increasing number of contracts in the UK where leaving/getting sacked before a certain length on time has passed makes the employee liable to re-reimburse all of the above costs and more, including travel, hotels, food expenses, etc.

Getting sacked and then being handed a bill is becoming increasingly common. I'm not talking about high powered executive positions here either, I'm talking about skilled labour in general. I could speculate about why it's hitting the "blue-collar"(I hate that fucking term) workforce more, but I'd be getting into speculation and probably paranoid ravings. 

[Left]

Why should we pay you at all?  If you have a second job, you're doing fine, in this economy.  In fact, you should donate some of your pay to us, for training costs and uniforms.  Not to mention the on hand, practical experience of working for a prime leader in the food services industry.

Would it be worth mentioning the increasing number of contracts in the UK where leaving/getting sacked before a certain length on time has passed makes the employee liable to re-reimburse all of the above costs and more, including travel, hotels, food expenses, etc.

Getting sacked and then being handed a bill is becoming increasingly common. I'm not talking about high powered executive positions here either, I'm talking about skilled labour in general. I could speculate about why it's hitting the "blue-collar"(I hate that fucking term) workforce more, but I'd be getting into speculation and probably paranoid ravings.

Paranoia is a logical response these days, though.
It's the people who AREN'T paranoid that really worry me, they are still drinking the kool-aid.

[Doktor Howl]

Why should we pay you at all?  If you have a second job, you're doing fine, in this economy.  In fact, you should donate some of your pay to us, for training costs and uniforms.  Not to mention the on hand, practical experience of working for a prime leader in the food services industry.

Would it be worth mentioning the increasing number of contracts in the UK where leaving/getting sacked before a certain length on time has passed makes the employee liable to re-reimburse all of the above costs and more, including travel, hotels, food expenses, etc.

Getting sacked and then being handed a bill is becoming increasingly common. I'm not talking about high powered executive positions here either, I'm talking about skilled labour in general. I could speculate about why it's hitting the "blue-collar"(I hate that fucking term) workforce more, but I'd be getting into speculation and probably paranoid ravings.

They tried that here, but fortunately, the 13th amendment is pretty clear about the subject.