I’m not saying the location or even the type of job this is, other than administrative. I work in department A within an organization under a different umbrella than another department B. Semi recently, there was a law passed making it mandatory for companies to list the salary in the job posting, and a job opened up in department B which shows they are making 13-15k more than anyone in my department. Now, I understand the work is slightly different, but honestly, and this is based on helpdesk ticket numbers and publicly available job descriptions, they do not have more work, or even more intricate work than our office does. And what’s more, they are often bad at their jobs (poor training, lack of consequences, lack of care), and it falls to my department to clean up their messes.
Now, call me a whiny millennial but I am SICK AND TIRED of being the clean up crew for this department on top of my existing job functions (which I believe I am already not being fairly compensated for, as we all had to take on more duties because of the pandemic). Add to that not receiving yearly raises for two years (again thanks pandemic) and the raises we have received being laughable (1% thanks for the one extra McNuggets meal a month).
What I think is happening here is that the umbrella department B is under has the CEOs ear and preference. I know life isn’t fair and whatever else but this feels quite frankly cruel. My department has been ignored, understaffed, overworked, underpaid, and any calls for HR to step in and re-evaluate our job description and pay have been met with “we’ll look into it soon” for MONTHS. The rising cost of living with inflation means that because we are living/working in an expensive area, none of us in my department can afford to live on one job. It is insane that this place expects overtime work and barely pays above “poverty” wages (its becoming more and more clear that poverty is just one or two missed paychecks away for a large portion of society, makes me want to scream)
Anyways, just wanted to rant. I’ve quietly and cautiously discussed striking/unionizing with some of my coworkers, but not many people are willing or able to risk being replaced. Which I get. It scares me too. The lack of any safety net means people feel like they can’t ask for fair and equitable compensation lest they risk poverty/homelessness, so they put up with this bullshit. What are we even supposed to do