There was a recent popular post about someone berating a manager for not increasing wages or shutting a store down due to a lack of staffing, and while that’s a nice idea, that’s not how managing a fast food or retail chain works.
I run one small clothing store with several hundred locations in the US, and my starting wage for associates is $10.00 in a state with a $9.30 minimum wage. My getting it to that number was such a big deal that my boss’s boss asked me to justify the extra 70 cent expense. I have no ability to actually make our wages “competitive”.
I cannot close the store without the express permission of my boss, who does not work in a store and therefore can’t be berated by customers like the one who posted today.
If I tell corporate that we can’t compete with nearby stores paying $15 an hour, they tell me that we have a “very competitive wage”.
I can’t affect change in these things, and I can’t leave for another company that genuinely does have solid wages because all of them are fully staffed as a result of those wage policies.
All I’m saying is, I hate the American wage culture just as much as anyone here. But like almost everyone here, I can’t fucking do anything about it. Please stop abusing me and people like me for things that are entirely out of our control.