Poll of the Day > Controversial Opinion: Common workers deserve a living wage.

(+) Yeah! (+)

Have you seen how much terrible treatment and abuse the average worker has to deal with? It's long hours, often being forced to work overtime, being treated like complete garbage by customers, being treated like complete garbage by management, and all in the service of some mega-company in their effort to make record-breaking profits. Many have to live in terrible conditions and survive off of garbage food in order to make ends meet all while some entitled waste living off their spouses paycheck calls them degenerate, idiotic, losers for doing those jobs. It's wretched, disgusting, and appalling. The least that can be done is paying them enough so that they don't have to work two jobs in order to survive or marry/roommate just to make ends meet.

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Of course.

Think about it in reverse, why work at all if you can't live off it... I mean, if you can't live by working what's the alternative?

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No, big corporations have to make money too you know.

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Many of these employees receive government assistance like food stamps, Medicaid, utility subsidies, and housing assistance. Since the employer doesn't have to pay the employees enough money to afford these things, your taxes are essentially being used to increase these company's profits.

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I think you were suppose to label this one #5...

Like how my post is #5...
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They deserve a more than livable wage.

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SunWuKung420 posted...

They deserve a more than livable wage.

I'd disagree, provided "livable" is defined somewhat generously (i.e. enough to live in reasonable health and comfort, not just the bare minimum needed to subsist). It's not reasonable or practical to expect employers to fund any more luxury than is needed to keep employees mentally healthy. Anything past a reasonable minimum should be treated as a luxury that the employee can aspired and work toward if they want to improve their life.

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Disagree 100%.

Not all jobs are meant to be done by someone supporting a family - and some of those would disappear if forced to provide a 'living' wage.

Also - 'living' wage can vary greatly depending upon where you are living. Until you can sort out the differences in cost of living, you can't clearly define what living wage is.

Nah automate everything let population control figure itself out.

They just need to lower taxes and CoL. Then the wages wouldnt seem too low. Good luck writing legislation on greed, however.

dedbus posted...

Nah automate everything let population control figure itself out.

This is basically whats going to happen and people are just accepting it or ignoring it. wE nEeD tO sAvE eVeRyOnE sO tHeY cAn ExIsT aS gOvErNmEnT rEvEnUe GenErAtOrS!

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Controversial opinion: Nobody "deserves" anything, people should earn things. If a job doesn't pay a living wage and people have the skills to do other things, that job goes unfilled and then eventually it's forced to either pay a higher wage or not exist.

Unbridled9 posted... The least that can be done is paying them enough so that they don't have to work two jobs in order to survive or marry/roommate just to make ends meet.

There's absolutely nothing wrong with having to take a roommate to cut costs and the demonization of roommates is absolutely moronic. Obviously there are pragmatic issues, but until America develops a better system of small homes -- which you actually see in other nations -- it's tough to economize there. And, on a somewhat related note, the US government actively makes it harder for people who want smaller, more sustainable dwelling. The regressive, fascist state of CT in particular is huge on attacking the tiny homes movement because it relies so heavily on properly taxes to pay its corrupt bureaucrats and for the welfare that helps those corrupt bureaucrats stay in office.

captpackrat posted...

Many of these employees receive government assistance like food stamps, Medicaid, utility subsidies, and housing assistance. Since the employer doesn't have to pay the employees enough money to afford these things, your taxes are essentially being used to increase these company's profits.

And that's a direct result of what happens when you have those programs, although it's also worth noting that many recipients of those programs don't work at all. You have a sizable population that doesn't hold any job (on paper, anyway -- some of them engage in illegal activities) that subsists either wholly or largely off government benefits. And this backwards-ass shit represents both money and people who could be put to much better use.

And, broadly speaking, the US government does a lot of stupid shit to compensate for the US government doing a lot of stupid shit.

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I wish I agreed with Zeus here but I've seen far too many jobs that treat employees like disposable garbage and refuse to pay anything more than minimum wage. For the amount of abuse many of these workers deal with most office workers wouldn't even consider without at least double minimum wage.

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Unbridled9 posted...

I wish I agreed with Zeus here but I've seen far too many jobs that treat employees like disposable garbage and refuse to pay anything more than minimum wage. For the amount of abuse many of these workers deal with most office workers wouldn't even consider without at least double minimum wage.

...which is why office workers get skills so they don't have to do those jobs. And office work is hardly the only alternative to those jobs, and -- most importantly -- there is terrible office work. Office work can be just as bad as lot of retail and food service jobs; telemarketing (and, to a somewhat lesser extent, phone-based customer service) is probably the best example since it's almost comparable to a front-end grocery clerk, if a clerk had every second of their life monitored and was evaluated on efficiency metrics as well as being expected to put 15-30 minutes of unpaid time each day.

And even if you exclude the unpaid time, most of them don't make much more than minimum wage.

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Zeus posted...

...which is why office workers get skills so they don't have to do those jobs. And office work is hardly the only alternative to those jobs, and -- most importantly -- there is terrible office work. Office work can be just as bad as lot of retail and food service jobs; telemarketing (and, to a somewhat lesser extent, phone-based customer service) is probably the best example since it's almost comparable to a front-end grocery clerk, if a clerk had every second of their life monitored and was evaluated on efficiency metrics as well as being expected to put 15-30 minutes of unpaid time each day.

And even if you exclude the unpaid time, most of them don't make much more than minimum wage.

Excuse me if I feel that it's bullshit to say office work can be 'just as bad' when I've had people demand I be fired because their kid stole a toothbrush and I asked for it back, or have had to literally clean up stalls covered in human feces from floor to ceiling, or been yelled at by my manager for not staying two hours after my shift ended to 'finish all the work' when the reason it wasn't done was because they cut back on the employee payroll leaving only one manager and one employee to handle the entire store.

When you say you see unskilled labor who should just go back to college and get other jobs I see people who are subject to abuse day in and day out effectively trapped by their need to do things like eat and support a family instead of going to college or engaging in job hunts. I see employees who stay up all night only to get harassed by managers and others for being 'lazy' and sleeping in the day. Or people who come in so sick they can't even speak because they're so terrified of being fired and/or unable to afford a doctors visit.

Your one example, telemarketing, doesn't do much to help your case either as your point is that they are effectively abused by their employers, forced to work overtime, and everything else instead of being treated like decent human beings and at least acknowledged for their hard work.

It would be one thing if employees were genuinely lazy. That's not what I saw though when I worked the floors. I saw hard working and, frankly, miserable employees just trying to get their work done and get through the day praying they would only be harrassed slightly less.

I'm not a communist. I think the whole concept behind it is BS. But the explotive capitalist system in place now, which grinds up workers and trods all over them while CEO's get massive bonuses, needs to go.

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In response to zeus, I have a class 1 license, and was still underpaid at my last job where I used it. All greed.

Got to pick up a box at the owners house and got a decent look at his R8 sitting in his two-car garage. Then I saw his super fridge that he ordered when it came in, too.

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Unbridled9 posted...

Excuse me if I feel that it's bullshit to say office work can be 'just as bad' when I've had people demand I be fired because their kid stole a toothbrush and I asked for it back, or have had to literally clean up stalls covered in human feces from floor to ceiling, or been yelled at by my manager for not staying two hours after my shift ended to 'finish all the work' when the reason it wasn't done was because they cut back on the employee payroll leaving only one manager and one employee to handle the entire store.

It might be a little naive to think that there are no office workers who have to deal with angry clients or bosses or have to deal with crunch time with project deadlines.

I don't think it's a terribly controversial thought that working in general isn't enjoyable; I've never enjoyed working and if I didn't get paid to do my job, there's no way I would do it. If I feel the compensation isn't good enough for the amount of crap I have to deal with, then I either negotiate a raise or find a different job.

When you say you see unskilled labor who should just go back to college and get other jobs I see people who are subject to abuse day in and day out effectively trapped by their need to do things like eat and support a family instead of going to college or engaging in job hunts. I see employees who stay up all night only to get harassed by managers and others for being 'lazy' and sleeping in the day. Or people who come in so sick they can't even speak because they're so terrified of being fired and/or unable to afford a doctors visit.

There are other options besides low skilled entry positions and going to college. There's a whole variety of skilled and semi-skilled labor positions out there that are constantly needing to be filled simply because they are either not glamorous (like plumbing or basically any trade), or people have never heard of them (there's about a hundred different types of medical technician for completely exotic medical equipment that nobody has heard of until you actually need to get tested on it). Trade schools, paid apprenticeships, free job training seminars, job placements, etc are things that are out there that people can look for. There may be hard decisions to make, but continuing in the same position without making any changes and hoping for it all to work out is wishful thinking.

kukukupo posted...

Also - 'living' wage can vary greatly depending upon where you are living. Until you can sort out the differences in cost of living, you can't clearly define what living wage is.

Sure you can. You just have to define it regionally. A flat federal minimum wage is stupid. A federally mandated algorithm that determines the minimum wage for a given business based on local cost of living, however, will not only ensure that businesses in cheap areas aren't hurt by the cost of living in expensive areas, it will help to regulate cost of living because uncontrolled inflation will make it too expensive for anyone to do business there.

Zeus posted...

If a job doesn't pay a living wage and people have the skills to do other things, that job goes unfilled and then eventually it's forced to either pay a higher wage or not exist.

Meanwhile, in the real world, there are significantly fewer living-wage jobs than there are people that need wages to live. "If a job pays too little, it will have to pay more in order to compete" is a nice fantasy, but the fact of the matter is that the threat of starvation and homelessness is enough to convince people to settle for wages that allow them to afford *something*, even if it's a pathetic facsimile of a healthy life.

Zeus posted...

Controversial opinion: Nobody "deserves" anything, people should earn things.

And employers should earn labour by paying workers enough to survive, given that worker survival is an inescapable requirement of having workers perform labour. If you're driving a car somewhere and you only put in enough gas for half of that trip, do you go crying to the government to push it the rest of the way for you? Do you whine about the "entitlement" of cars when people suggest that you should put more gas in instead? Of course not, because that would be unimaginably stupid. And yet here you are, defending Walmart putting only half (if not less) of the necessary gas in each of their cars and expecting taxpayers to push them the rest of the way.

When you say "you don't deserve a living wage for this job," you are saying "I need you to do this work, but I think you should starve to death while you do it." That's a really shitty thing to say.

Zeus posted...

There's absolutely nothing wrong with having to take a roommate to cut costs and the demonization of roommates is absolutely moronic.

I will agree there (though perhaps not as strongly). As much as roommates can suck, I don't think living alone is ever going to be a realistic standard for a minimum wage. Not in an urban setting, at least, where space is limited enough that the inefficiency of having a bathroom and kitchen for each person is inevitably going to drive costs up quite a bit. My concept for the aforementioned minimum wage algorithm treats 1/3 of a 3-bedroom apartment as a reasonable standard for the sort of rent people should be expected to cover by working full-time. Somebody that wants to cut costs further can live with more people, somebody that wants fewer roommates can cut costs some other way (commute further, eat more cheaply, reduce utility bills) or treat that as something to work toward as they advance their career.

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There are other options besides low skilled entry positions and going to college. There's a whole variety of skilled and semi-skilled labor positions out there that are constantly needing to be filled simply because they are either not glamorous (like plumbing or basically any trade), or people have never heard of them (there's about a hundred different types of medical technician for completely exotic medical equipment that nobody has heard of until you actually need to get tested on it). Trade schools, paid apprenticeships, free job training seminars, job placements, etc are things that are out there that people can look for. There may be hard decisions to make, but continuing in the same position without making any changes and hoping for it all to work out is wishful thinking.

All those things take time to learn though. When you're a single mother trying to feed her child you don't have the time to learn plumbing. If you're someone living paycheck to paycheck to try and stave off bills and debts a single missed week can be the difference between 'survival' and 'jailtime'. Plus let's not forget that there's only so many trade jobs and/or alternatives.

If you don't think someone should be able to survive doing a job, do you think we should even have the job at all?

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Unbridled9 posted...

If you don't think someone should be able to survive doing a job, do you think we should even have the job at all?

Really, this is the crux of it. If a job needs to exist, somebody needs to survive in order to perform it. Therefore, that job should - in a functional society - provide the wages needed to survive. If it can't, the economy is broken.

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Federal minimum wage is a livable wage in most locations.

In select locations, minimum wage needs increased.

blu posted...

Federal minimum wage is a livable wage in most locations.

In select locations, minimum wage needs increased.

It hasn't been like that in decades seeing as minimum wage hasn't gone up with inflation

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blu posted...

Federal minimum wage is a livable wage in most locations.

lol

I've lived on less than federal minimum wage for several years across two locations. Nowadays I spend about 50% more than it but could easily cut a few thousand from my budget by switching to a different nearby apartment and another few thousand by limiting entertainment and eating out less.

My life is very different as I don't have the huge amount of stress that comes along with federal minimum wage, but also it's livable in most places. Definitely not all places.

Unbridled9 posted...

All those things take time to learn though. When you're a single mother trying to feed her child you don't have the time to learn plumbing. If you're someone living paycheck to paycheck to try and stave off bills and debts a single missed week can be the difference between 'survival' and 'jailtime'. Plus let's not forget that there's only so many trade jobs and/or alternatives.

Many trade and vocational schools offer evening classes for this reason. Apprenticeships generally pay you while you learn on the job as an assistant. My old employer is constantly looking for people but it's in a relatively obscure field that nobody doing a casual job search is going to turn up because it never occurs to them to look it up.

Yes, being a single mother living paycheck to paycheck on a minimum wage job and still going into debt is a bad situation to be in, but how many of these problems are the fault of the employer?

Unbridled9 posted...

If you don't think someone should be able to survive doing a job, do you think we should even have the job at all?

Jobs generally exist because the employer derives value greater than or equal to the cost of having an employee. If a prospective employee thinks the compensation is worth the time and effort working the job then it all works out between two consenting entities.

Hospy posted...

Many trade and vocational schools offer evening classes for this reason.

Thats if you have time, though. A single mother working two jobs may not have that time. Even working one job, they may not have time... For example, people still need sleep...

Hospy posted...

but how many of these problems are the fault of the employer?

I think thatll change person to person...
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Participating in society, performing a job, regardless of the stature of any profession, should merit a wage that allows people to reasonably enjoy their lives, engaging in hobbies and such while, being able to afford reasonable housing, food and care. This isn't an impossible idea.

Maybe even have a community fund to assist in providing essentials all individuals need while helping to find ways to incorporate individuals into helpful roles.

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Mead posted...

Can't agree more

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Hospy posted...

Jobs generally exist because the employer derives value greater than or equal to the cost of having an employee.

Hence this comment:
adjl posted...

If a job needs to exist, somebody needs to survive in order to perform it. Therefore, that job should - in a functional society - provide the wages needed to survive. If it can't, the economy is broken.

Ultimately, it's not feasible to expect an employer to pay an employee more than that employee makes for them, but if that requires many workers to work for sub-living wages, that's not a working system.

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LinkPizza posted...

Thats if you have time, though. A single mother working two jobs may not have that time. Even working one job, they may not have time... For example, people still need sleep...

You mean people in a first world country shouldn't be forced in to torturous situations to climb out of subsistence? What a wild and totally not reasonable stance lol
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blu posted...

Federal minimum wage is a livable wage in most locations.

The current federal minimum wage is $7.25 and hasn't been raised since 2009. The highest it's ever been, adjusted for inflation, was in 1968 when it was $1.60, which is equal to $12.30 in 2021 dollars, and even that amount would only get you an apartment in 13 states.

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The extra sucky thing about the minimum wage being stuck at $7.25 since 2009 is that adjusted for inflation, that was the equivalent of almost $9 an hour back then, so essentially every minimum wage employee has had a pay cut of $1.75 since then.

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captpackrat posted...

The current federal minimum wage is $7.25 and hasn't been raised since 2009. The highest it's ever been, adjusted for inflation, was in 1968 when it was $1.60, which is equal to $12.30 in 2021 dollars, and even that amount would only get you an apartment in 13 states.

wait a tick... that makes no sense... every recession is almost immediately remedied by raising the minimum wage... but that can't possibly be right - kappa

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LinkPizza posted...

Thats if you have time, though. A single mother working two jobs may not have that time. Even working one job, they may not have time... For example, people still need sleep...

The unfortunate truth is that if you are a single mother working two jobs and still aren't making ends meet, that's not a sustainable situation to begin with. At some point something is going to happen, whether your hours get cut, your position gets removed, an emergency pops up, and you're going to have to make hard decisions on what to do. You are probably better off making those hard decisions on your own time to invest in your future rather than waiting for the world to force you to make those choices.

LinkPizza posted...

I think thatll change person to person...

Your employer is there to provide compensation in exchange for your time and effort. I don't think your employer is responsible for you having children, or breaking up your relationship/marriage, or for the partner not providing childcare/spousal benefits, or for how much money you spend.

adjl posted...

Ultimately, it's not feasible to expect an employer to pay an employee more than that employee makes for them, but if that requires many workers to work for sub-living wages, that's not a working system.

The question then is are these employees better off with a job that doesn't pay very much, or no job at all? Manufacturing in particular has suffered heavily from outsourcing to other countries where the cost of labor is a fraction of what it is here. I'm not condoning the practice, it's just that there are always unintended consequences when the basic equation is meddled with.

Places like Pittsburgh were always going to be better off transitioning away from the relatively slow-skilled steel industry, but there's at least one generation of workers who probably wished it was an actual transition rather than an abrupt collapse.

Hospy posted...

The unfortunate truth is that if you are a single mother working two jobs and still aren't making ends meet, that's not a sustainable situation to begin with. At some point something is going to happen, whether your hours get cut, your position gets removed, an emergency pops up, and you're going to have to make hard decisions on what to do. You are probably better off making those hard decisions on your own time to invest in your future rather than waiting for the world to force you to make those choices.

It's hard to make those decisions, though. Many people work keeping what they can together until something happens... Because they want that miracle to happen. Regardless, it doesn't make sense to go to a night class when you literally have no time... Not to mention, probably don't have the money. Because I think those also cost something, don't they? And I think they night classes were more...

Hospy posted...

Your employer is there to provide compensation in exchange for your time and effort. I don't think your employer is responsible for you having children, or breaking up your relationship/marriage, or for the partner not providing childcare/spousal benefits, or for how much money you spend.

Not that. What I mean is, some employers are dicks and can screw you over even when they know that by doing certain things, they'll put you in more trouble or more debt... And they can definitely break up marriages by making it so you have no free time or other stuff, though that also depends on the job... or spend. These aren't super common or anything. But definitely possible...
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Hospy posted...

Many trade and vocational schools offer evening classes for this reason. Apprenticeships generally pay you while you learn on the job as an assistant. My old employer is constantly looking for people but it's in a relatively obscure field that nobody doing a casual job search is going to turn up because it never occurs to them to look it up.

Yes, being a single mother living paycheck to paycheck on a minimum wage job and still going into debt is a bad situation to be in, but how many of these problems are the fault of the employer?

Jobs generally exist because the employer derives value greater than or equal to the cost of having an employee. If a prospective employee thinks the compensation is worth the time and effort working the job then it all works out between two consenting entities.

so you think that all people with jobs take the job believing that what they are compensated is reasonable and fair?

LinkPizza posted...

It's hard to make those decisions, though. Many people work keeping what they can together until something happens... Because they want that miracle to happen. Regardless, it doesn't make sense to go to a night class when you literally have no time... Not to mention, probably don't have the money. Because I think those also cost something, don't they? And I think they night classes were more...

I absolutely agree that it's hard to make those decisions, but the alternative is to not make any changes which is guaranteed not to work. We can make unlimited excuses why we can't do x, y, or z, but the point is that every person is in control of what they decide to do.

LinkPizza posted...

Not that. What I mean is, some employers are dicks and can screw you over even when they know that by doing certain things, they'll put you in more trouble or more debt... And they can definitely break up marriages by making it so you have no free time or other stuff, though that also depends on the job... or spend. These aren't super common or anything. But definitely possible...

There are things you can and cannot change. I cannot change the fact that my employer may be a dick (unless they are doing something actually illegal in which case I probably can). I can choose to not work there and find another place of employment.

Fam_Fam posted...

so you think that all people with jobs take the job believing that what they are compensated is reasonable and fair?

No, but I think the person best qualified to know whether the amount of money they get paid for their work is reasonable to them is that person.

Hospy posted...

I absolutely agree that it's hard to make those decisions, but the alternative is to not make any changes which is guaranteed not to work. We can make unlimited excuses why we can't do x, y, or z, but the point is that every person is in control of what they decide to do.

But if your choices are to keep working, and make enough to live. Or try to change, which could end up putting you and your children in a worse spot, the obvious answer is to keep working. It sucks and is hard, but it's still the safer choice at the time since you know that if nothing changes, you can still live. Taking the class could end up bad if in the end, you can't do that job. Or learn it and can't land a job doing that...

Hospy posted...

There are things you can and cannot change. I cannot change the fact that my employer may be a dick (unless they are doing something actually illegal in which case I probably can). I can choose to not work there and find another place of employment.

If you can. That;s where the problem lies. It's not always fast and easy to find a job. Especially when you need the money you're making. In the case of a single mother who needs every penny she earns, it'll be nearly impossible to find a job quick while working and taking care of children...
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<img src="">

It's pretty difficult to characterize an entire state's apartment market by a single number, but I've been able to afford an apartment while spending less than 2000*minimum hourly wage in a year in three of these states.

There's also the option of studio apartments, and then multiple bedroom apartments with roomates or in mobile homes (which are very nice options, I'm not suggesting an RV). Less than 15% of people live alone at anyway.

> The current federal minimum wage is $7.25 and hasn't been raised since 2009. The highest it's ever been, adjusted for inflation, was in 1968 when it was $1.60, which is equal to $12.30 in 2021 dollars, and even that amount would only get you an apartment in 13 states.

Come on, 24.6k will only get you a one bedroom apartment in 13 states? Here's a one bedroom apartment in Seattle for $800 a month available now. 10k annually. It would be very tight living in Seattle on minimum wage...but also this is Seattle here and one of the most expensive places on the graphic.
https://www.apartments.com/818-ne-106th-st-seattle-wa/ttt6zr9/

blu posted...

<img src="">

It's pretty difficult to characterize an entire state's apartment market by a single number, but I've been able to afford an apartment while spending less than 2000*minimum hourly wage in a year in three of these states.

There's also the option of studio apartments, and then multiple bedroom apartments with roomates or in mobile homes (which are very nice options, I'm not suggesting an RV). Less than 15% of people live alone at anyway.

> The current federal minimum wage is $7.25 and hasn't been raised since 2009. The highest it's ever been, adjusted for inflation, was in 1968 when it was $1.60, which is equal to $12.30 in 2021 dollars, and even that amount would only get you an apartment in 13 states.

Come on, 24.6k will only get you a one bedroom apartment in 13 states? Here's a one bedroom apartment in Seattle for $800 a month available now. 10k annually. It would be very tight living in Seattle on minimum wage...but also this is Seattle here and one of the most expensive places on the graphic.
https://www.apartments.com/818-ne-106th-st-seattle-wa/ttt6zr9/

come on man

*$800 Rent until July 2021*. After july the regular every month rent will be $1250.

captpackrat posted...

The current federal minimum wage is $7.25 and hasn't been raised since 2009. The highest it's ever been, adjusted for inflation, was in 1968 when it was $1.60, which is equal to $12.30 in 2021 dollars, and even that amount would only get you an apartment in 13 states.

I've lived in two of those states on less money than what is in the chart. It is also very hard to make a whole state have one number. This is the problem with the whole cost of living number - it isn't just state to state it can be 10 miles to the west is really expensive and 10 miles to the east is really cheap. Nearly impossible to try and make rent/wages/whatever fluctuate to 'cost of living' whatever arbitrary number that may be.

Also - 'living' is an arbitrary definition as well. You can live very differently on the same dollar amount. What constitutes a 'living' wage?

Fam_Fam posted...

come on man

*$800 Rent until July 2021*. After july the regular every month rent will be $1250.

Even at $1250, still doable on minimum wage ($12/hour in Seattle...actually they raised again to now $16.39) with enough left over for the rest of living expenses to live in the most expensive city in the USA. Certainly not the $21.56/hour=43k a year your figure quotes needed to live just in Washington State. Your figure gives a value of about double what you need to live a life with modern amenities.

Seattle is one of the places federal minimum wage may not be quite that smooth because it's one of the most expensive cities in the USA. But also with about 20 seconds of effort I was able to cut expenses by half from the graphic. Anyone could cut down living expenses to federal minimum wage especially once you include a roommate in Seattle one of the most expensive cities in the USA...so it's certainly pretty easy when you aren't in one of those cities.

Do remember that property becomes cheaper once you move out of the cities and into more rural areas. What may be an apartment in the city may be a full-on house with a sizable chunk of land out in the rural areas.

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Unbridled9 posted...

Do remember that property becomes cheaper once you move out of the cities and into more rural areas. What may be an apartment in the city may be a full-on house with a sizable chunk of land out in the rural areas.

and as we all know people that look different have been historically more than welcome in some of those rural areas

https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/georgia-governor-calls-shooting-video-absolutely-horrific-70566532


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LinkPizza posted...

But if your choices are to keep working, and make enough to live. Or try to change, which could end up putting you and your children in a worse spot, the obvious answer is to keep working. It sucks and is hard, but it's still the safer choice at the time since you know that if nothing changes, you can still live. Taking the class could end up bad if in the end, you can't do that job. Or learn it and can't land a job doing that...
If you can. That;s where the problem lies. It's not always fast and easy to find a job. Especially when you need the money you're making. In the case of a single mother who needs every penny she earns, it'll be nearly impossible to find a job quick while working and taking care of children...

Your choices are: remaining in a position that you know is terrible and is never going to improve unless someone else does something, or make a change to try and get out of that situation. Staying and working and hoping it fixes itself isn't the "obvious" answer, it's just avoiding having to make a hard decision which in itself is a decision.

There are risks to everything in life. Yes, there are risks to looking for a jobs. Yes, you might not be able to get a job fast or easy. But if you never look you're guaranteeing that you'll never get a better job.

Mead posted...

and as we all know people that look different have been historically more than welcome in some of those rural areas

https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/georgia-governor-calls-shooting-video-absolutely-horrific-70566532

Generally speaking, urban crime rates are higher than that of suburban and rural areas.

Hospy posted...

Your choices are: remaining in a position that you know is terrible and is never going to improve unless someone else does something, or make a change to try and get out of that situation. Staying and working and hoping it fixes itself isn't the "obvious" answer, it's just avoiding having to make a hard decision which in itself is a decision.

There are risks to everything in life. Yes, there are risks to looking for a jobs. Yes, you might not be able to get a job fast or easy. But if you never look you're guaranteeing that you'll never get a better job.

It's the obvious answer because it the safe answer. Changing could end up causing a lot more problems. And it's putting not only you, but your children at risk, as well. Many might do it if it was only them. But when children are involve, lots of people will take the safer route...
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LinkPizza posted...

It's the obvious answer because it the safe answer. Changing could end up causing a lot more problems. And it's putting not only you, but your children at risk, as well. Many might do it if it was only them. But when children are involve, lots of people will take the safer route...

The entire point is that it's not the safe answer. If you're spending all your time and never getting ahead, you're betting on that nothing bad is ever going to happen in the future which is, at best, wishful thinking.

Hospy posted...

The entire point is that it's not the safe answer. If you're spending all your time and never getting ahead, you're betting on that nothing bad is ever going to happen in the future which is, at best, wishful thinking.

The reason why its the safe answer is because its still working...
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LinkPizza posted...

The reason why its the safe answer is because its still working...

Right up until it stops working.

The question is whether you make that change on your own terms or the world forces you to.

Hospy posted...

Right up until it stops working.

The question is whether you make that change on your own terms or the world forces you to.

Waiting for the world to force you would probably be ok, though. You do what you do until you cant anymore, then make the risk because theres no other choice. If you make the risk on your own and fail, its worse because you could have still been ok. If the world forces you, you didnt change until you had to. So you went as far as you could. Who cares about the pride of switching yourself if you fail?
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