I just got off of a 1-hour 29 minute phone call with a potential job in my city. The phone interview ended quickly once the owner of the company offered me less than I wanted.
Backstory
I graduated from a 2-year community college photography program 3 years ago. I graduated with honours and awards from Adobe. Once I got out of school I busted my ass working for 3 different companies in the photography field that all had pay ranging in the $14.75-$15.40 (Canadian dollar) range. I tried so hard to bargain in the interview process for better pay but I was met with crossed arms and rejections while being promised raises if I worked hard so I worked so hard. I would sometimes wake up at 3 am just to drive 2 hours to a school and photograph 400 to 600 children alone. At all of these jobs, we were always underemployed and sometimes I would do the job of 3 people. At the end of the day, I was laid off from all my jobs as COVID and seasonal jobs died down and I never received a raise larger than 20 cents.
At one of those jobs, I had my boss calling me at 8 pm on workdays telling me to get back on the computer to fix something or to drive over to his residence to pick things up.
I lost my last job due to having a lack of work last year and I developed issues with my health. I had to undergo life-saving surgery with major complications. I developed necrosis and lost an organ through the winter and accumulated lots of debt since my employment insurance ran out. Even now I am still having crippling issues with my health.
Finally, it has been two months and I am back to looking for work and applying to places. I just had an interview for another job in my field today and the employer spoke to me for 120 minutes. He said in the interview that “no one wants to work anymore”. He asked me how much I wanted to pay. I told him I wanted a minimum of $16 (CAD) an hour as I have 3 years of experience, lots of references and a college diploma and that I needed to make a living wage. He then said “You know I understand where you are coming from, but if we paid everyone more then nobody would be tipping at restaurants, you know? Some servers go out of their way to separate everything on the plate and work fast and efficiently to deliver everything for their client's needs while others don’t offer that value” he then continued to rant for about 2 minutes and then said he had to go.
I am honestly so frustrated. What did we do as a society to deserve this? I was told to work hard, and always have a smile on my face. Spend 15 years of my life at school. Get a good-paying job right out of school, Buy a house (impossible in Canada for the working class) have kids and live happily ever after. Well, it's been three years and I still have student loans to pay. I am still offered less than $16 everywhere I go. I am still struggling to survive.
My living expenses are in Canadian dollars- rent is split at $675. I pay about $80 a month for electricity, $120-180 a month for gas to keep the rental house at 68 degrees (in the winter thanks to Canada), $50-60 a month in water bills, $90 a week for a phone plan with Rogers, $60 a month for tech-savvy internet,$80-$120 a week on basic canned groceries and $50 on the bus. In total, I spend about $1,605 a month just to survive. That leaves me with about $495 a month left over to pay for tuition, hygiene products and save up to buy an $850,000 house in my area.
I feel like we as a collective in North America failed. I feel like we didn’t stand up for our rights and freedoms enough. I feel like we allowed ourselves to be exploited while we were busily on our phones scrolling and scrolling endlessly on distracting websites and applications like Tiktok, YouTube etc. I feel like we gave up as a collective as many young people are more interested in a slap at the Oscars over losing benefits and taking pay cuts to inflation.
Yet again I feel even worse for the people we take advantage of in second and third-world nations who work way harder than some of us and are paid way less than we are, just so we can buy cheaper products from Walmart while we continue our vicious cycle of poverty.
What do all of you think?
Edit: I got an email back from the employer asking to come in for an interview. I will update all of you if there is interest.