Have any of your contracts been opened up and put to a vote to increase wages for new hires recently? Apparently this is something the company wants to do in order to be able to hire people. Kroger didn't want to give grandfathered employees an increase, but were forced to by the union.
Even if they get paid more per hour, they'll just have their hours cut down to practically nothing. One of the topics during the Republican debate the other night is whether or not the minimum wage should be raised to $15.00/hr. All of them said no and I agree. It will put the local mom and pop stores out of business because they can't afford to pay anybody that much, and the larger companies and corporations will simply absorb the cost by cutting hours down to practically nothing. Personally I don't think there should be a minimum wage. I think employers should be able to offer whatever they want for a job and when someone takes that job, they agree to work for that wage. If a company doesn't get any employees at the wage they're offering, they'll have to keep offering more money until they do. Without a minimum wage law, there will be more competition between companies for good workers. Besides, there are a lot of jobs that are not worth $15.00/hr. Many of those jobs are jobs one might find at a grocery store or other retail outlet. If you're going to be paid that much, you need to have more responsibility than just being a bagger, a checker, or a stock person.
Have any of your contracts been opened up and put to a vote to increase wages for new hires recently? Apparently this is something the company wants to do in order to be able to hire people. Kroger didn't want to give grandfathered employees an increase, but were forced to by the union.
I haven't heard of anything like that here. Some people that I work with have said that the union has, on more that one occasion, tried to get Kroger to come to the negotiation table early to discuss wage increases that could be put into effect ahead of the next contract negotiation, but Kroger has repeatedly said "no" to that. I don't know how true that is though, if at all. However, it's not at all fair for new hires to get better wages over those that are currently employed with the company, so good for the union in making it so that everyone got an increase in your area. That's how it should be.
I respectfully disagree with the second post in this thread. I don't know if any one here watches the Kyle Kulinski Show (Secular Talk Radio) on YouTube or elsewhere, but I agree with him one-hundred percent on why the Republicans are wrong on this and why minimum wage laws are not only necessary, but need to be reworked so that they better keep up with the cost of living. If anyone is interested, here's the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKA4gRHLnaE
People should be paid a living wage. If there was no minimum wage laws, those with the most power, control and money would be exploiting and crushing those underneath them even more than they are now and we'd have an even smaller middle class in this country and an even bigger gap between the rich and the poor, and an even larger percentage of poor/lower class folks. We need to fix the minimum wage laws, along with our education system and other parts of our country as well in order to improve the standard and quality of living in America. Raising the minimum wage alone doesn't solve all our problems... but it's one fix among many other necessary fixes that will benefit the majority down the road.
-- Edited by GenesisOne on Thursday 12th of November 2015 10:45:50 PM
i actually fount out about this only recently, we got a couple of new courtesy clerks that joined our store and the only reason that i figured out about this is cause one of them said im getting 7.55 an hour.... my base pay was 7.45 when i joined the store i worked at and after working a little over a year have i gotten a 10 cent raise
Joe's Crab Shack seafood restaurant announced they will be paying all the waiters and waitresses $14.00 an hour. They will be increasing the price on the menu items to cover the cost. Good for the employees but we, as customers have to pay for their wage increase. I don't think increasing the minimum wage does much good if the consumer has to pay for the increase.
The economics model of eliminating minimum wage, stimulating free markets competition, reducing and/or ending altogether government involvement in the private sector has many good qualities. Leveling the playing field and boosting open opportunities to work, build and succeed for ourselves is at the heart of what made this country.
Problem is, like all absolutes, these things don't work for long. No minimum wage? That's been tried. Raising it out of pace with inflation? That can't work either.
U.S.A. is in direct competition with 2nd and 3rd world counties, and that's only a step up from slave labor. The systematic destruction of our middle class is going to bring us to that very 2nd and 3rd world class in many terrible ways.
You gotta have minimum wage because it's not realistic that everyone can get schooling and good jobs......yet there must be checks/balances on that very system.
And American industry is going to have to find new, competitive niches with which to control and dominate our market shares-------but the political and financial interests MUST be kept in American interests, about, by and for American business leaders. I think this can be done, but it's gonna get much uglier in the meanwhile.
I don't mind getting my hours cut if I'm making more money, as long as I'm making the same amount as before the hours got cut. Same amount of pay for less work? Hell yes!
I don't mind getting my hours cut if I'm making more money, as long as I'm making the same amount as before the hours got cut. Same amount of pay for less work? Hell yes!
I don't think it's going to quite work out that way.
I don't mind getting my hours cut if I'm making more money, as long as I'm making the same amount as before the hours got cut. Same amount of pay for less work? Hell yes!
Until you realize that you'll get 0 hours every week.
As it stands now, at what Kroger starts you at and depending on your department, you're getting stiffed for hours anyways.
I want a minimum wage increase. However, I do not want the extreme of $15 that's being thrown about. I would even be happy at $10. But the thing is, **** is getting more expensive and the wages are still the same. My rent has gone up TWICE this year. I'm still waiting for my raise...
I wouldn't mind more money. Just leave the hours we have ALONE! corporate DOES NOT need bonuses. They make ENOUGH! (I know corporate reads these, so idgaf what they think)
I wouldn't mind more money. Just leave the hours we have ALONE! corporate DOES NOT need bonuses. They make ENOUGH! (I know corporate reads these, so idgaf what they think)
And that's part of the reason why we need minimum wage laws. Without such laws in place, most corporate entities would pay employees even less money and stick that extra cash in their pockets. You do have some companies out there that do the right thing by taking care of employees so that the employee productivity is high and stays high, plus the employees stick around longer and are more reliable, but most see employees as a controllable cost and executives use their position of power and control to enrich themselves while throwing the scraps to everyone underneath them. There has to be regulations and laws to keep people in check, because otherwise, a majority of the rich and powerful would seek more wealth and more power through the exploitation of those under them. It's unfortunate President Obama hasn't pushed harder to level the playing field and raise the minimum wage across the country. Get the minimum wage up to improve the quality of life for a big segment of the population while repairing, restructuring and restoring the education system so education becomes more accessible and enables those that were once making minimum wage to go to school and find a path to different career. There's a lot more that needs to be done besides raising minimum wage to address the problems in the here and now and the challenges ahead, but it would be at least one step in the right direction towards fixing what's wrong in this country.
I'm just a cashier but we should make at least $10/hr from the perspective that the store/company makes a lot of money, e.g. like how the NBA players are going to make twice as much with the new salary cap since the new TV deals mean a huge increase in revenue for the league. I think McDonalds workers shouldn't be asking for $15/hr but $8/hr is ridiculous given that I'm the middleman in about, what, $1,000 a day in customer sales? That goes doubly so for the grocery and nonfoods peeps that put this crap on the shelf.
And that's part of the reason why we need minimum wage laws. Without such laws in place, most corporate entities would pay employees even less money and stick that extra cash in their pockets. You do have some companies out there that do the right thing by taking care of employees so that the employee productivity is high and stays high, plus the employees stick around longer and are more reliable, but most see employees as a controllable cost and executives use their position of power and control to enrich themselves while throwing the scraps to everyone underneath them. There has to be regulations and laws to keep people in check, because otherwise, a majority of the rich and powerful would seek more wealth and more power through the exploitation of those under them. It's unfortunate President Obama hasn't pushed harder to level the playing field and raise the minimum wage across the country. Get the minimum wage up to improve the quality of life for a big segment of the population while repairing, restructuring and restoring the education system so education becomes more accessible and enables those that were once making minimum wage to go to school and find a path to different career. There's a lot more that needs to be done besides raising minimum wage to address the problems in the here and now and the challenges ahead, but it would be at least one step in the right direction towards fixing what's wrong in this country.
Typical Liberal attitude about leveling the playing field and expecting everything to be handed to you without doing the necessary work. You do realize that these CEO's worked their up through the system to get where they are don't you? They went to school. They got a degree. They started out at the bottom and worked their way up. I don't fault them one bit. I could have done the same thing if I had had the drive and ambition. Sure the CEO of Kroger makes a lot of money but if you take that and divide it among all the Kroger employees it comes out to be less than a dollar a week per employee. Besides, do you really think a cashier's job is on the same level as a CEO's?
And that's part of the reason why we need minimum wage laws. Without such laws in place, most corporate entities would pay employees even less money and stick that extra cash in their pockets. You do have some companies out there that do the right thing by taking care of employees so that the employee productivity is high and stays high, plus the employees stick around longer and are more reliable, but most see employees as a controllable cost and executives use their position of power and control to enrich themselves while throwing the scraps to everyone underneath them. There has to be regulations and laws to keep people in check, because otherwise, a majority of the rich and powerful would seek more wealth and more power through the exploitation of those under them. It's unfortunate President Obama hasn't pushed harder to level the playing field and raise the minimum wage across the country. Get the minimum wage up to improve the quality of life for a big segment of the population while repairing, restructuring and restoring the education system so education becomes more accessible and enables those that were once making minimum wage to go to school and find a path to different career. There's a lot more that needs to be done besides raising minimum wage to address the problems in the here and now and the challenges ahead, but it would be at least one step in the right direction towards fixing what's wrong in this country.
Typical Liberal attitude about leveling the playing field and expecting everything to be handed to you without doing the necessary work. You do realize that these CEO's worked their up through the system to get where they are don't you? They went to school. They got a degree. They started out at the bottom and worked their way up. I don't fault them one bit. I could have done the same thing if I had had the drive and ambition. Sure the CEO of Kroger makes a lot of money but if you take that and divide it among all the Kroger employees it comes out to be less than a dollar a week per employee. Besides, do you really think a cashier's job is on the same level as a CEO's?
No, I don't think a cashier's job is on the same level as a CEO's. I do however believe a cashier working at Kroger in my state would have a better shot at bettering his/her life if he/she made more than $7.55 an hour starting out and earning only $0.10 an hour raise per every nine months. We need to make it easier for the people of this country to lift themselves out of poverty and the lower end of the middle class spectrum. I don't believe people should be just given a free ride to a higher quality of life. They should work their way up, as everyone should. To do that though, you need to, yes, level the playing field, and leveling the playing field requires addressing several issues in this country, and one of those issues is addressing the minimum wage and transforming it into a living wage so that people don't have to work two or three jobs at once and instead can replace that second and/or third job with college or vocational school. People working at Kroger and going to school at the same time shouldn't still be going into deep debt because of their college goals, so education needs to be more accessible and affordable and retooled so that the average person today can be the CEO of tomorrow, if he or she chooses. There are CEOs out there not at all like the Kroger CEO that pay his/her employees a living wage and provide them with the training and guidance to either climb the ladder within the company or the ability to pursue higher learning without having to balance a second job in the process or go deeply into debt.
Drive and ambition alone are not always enough to get ahead when there are so many obstacles deliberately and indirectly put into place by those that control the majority of wealth in this country and have a vested interest in manipulating and exploiting the system for personal gain. I have more respect for a CEO that only makes a modest salary and uses a greater percentage of the company's profits to provide better pay and benefits to his/her employees than a CEO that makes multiple millions a year on top of bonuses and leaves little for his/her employees. It's easy to tell an employee that works for a greedy CEO that only pays barely above minimum wage to just go out and get a better paying job, but in practice, that's not always a practical solution as better paying jobs are not always readily available or accessible. There's so much that's broken in this country and too much power-hoarding, exploitation for personal gain and corruption going on, so yes, we do need to level the playing field and we need reform across the board, from minimum wage laws to the education system to the healthcare system. The middle class continues to shrink while the number of poor people continues to grow all the while those with money and power add even more money and power to their positions and further rig the system in their favor. Things will only worsen in this country if we don't stop with applying bandages and calling it day or turning a blind eye to issues that have been worsening for decades now.
You want to call it a typical liberal attitude? That's fine by me. Labels are merely a distraction from the real problems and issues that are going on now and have been going on for years now.
And that's part of the reason why we need minimum wage laws. Without such laws in place, most corporate entities would pay employees even less money and stick that extra cash in their pockets. You do have some companies out there that do the right thing by taking care of employees so that the employee productivity is high and stays high, plus the employees stick around longer and are more reliable, but most see employees as a controllable cost and executives use their position of power and control to enrich themselves while throwing the scraps to everyone underneath them. There has to be regulations and laws to keep people in check, because otherwise, a majority of the rich and powerful would seek more wealth and more power through the exploitation of those under them. It's unfortunate President Obama hasn't pushed harder to level the playing field and raise the minimum wage across the country. Get the minimum wage up to improve the quality of life for a big segment of the population while repairing, restructuring and restoring the education system so education becomes more accessible and enables those that were once making minimum wage to go to school and find a path to different career. There's a lot more that needs to be done besides raising minimum wage to address the problems in the here and now and the challenges ahead, but it would be at least one step in the right direction towards fixing what's wrong in this country.
Typical Liberal attitude about leveling the playing field and expecting everything to be handed to you without doing the necessary work. You do realize that these CEO's worked their up through the system to get where they are don't you? They went to school. They got a degree. They started out at the bottom and worked their way up. I don't fault them one bit. I could have done the same thing if I had had the drive and ambition. Sure the CEO of Kroger makes a lot of money but if you take that and divide it among all the Kroger employees it comes out to be less than a dollar a week per employee. Besides, do you really think a cashier's job is on the same level as a CEO's?
"Make a better situation for yourself by working hard! Oh, but if you don't have a college education, we're not going to pay you much for your hard work. Go to college and better yourself and get a better job! But again we're not going to pay you that much so you need to work 3 jobs while going to school or else enjoy your mountain of debt that you'll be paying off for the majority of your life. "
And that's part of the reason why we need minimum wage laws. Without such laws in place, most corporate entities would pay employees even less money and stick that extra cash in their pockets. You do have some companies out there that do the right thing by taking care of employees so that the employee productivity is high and stays high, plus the employees stick around longer and are more reliable, but most see employees as a controllable cost and executives use their position of power and control to enrich themselves while throwing the scraps to everyone underneath them. There has to be regulations and laws to keep people in check, because otherwise, a majority of the rich and powerful would seek more wealth and more power through the exploitation of those under them. It's unfortunate President Obama hasn't pushed harder to level the playing field and raise the minimum wage across the country. Get the minimum wage up to improve the quality of life for a big segment of the population while repairing, restructuring and restoring the education system so education becomes more accessible and enables those that were once making minimum wage to go to school and find a path to different career. There's a lot more that needs to be done besides raising minimum wage to address the problems in the here and now and the challenges ahead, but it would be at least one step in the right direction towards fixing what's wrong in this country.
Typical Liberal attitude about leveling the playing field and expecting everything to be handed to you without doing the necessary work. You do realize that these CEO's worked their up through the system to get where they are don't you? They went to school. They got a degree. They started out at the bottom and worked their way up. I don't fault them one bit. I could have done the same thing if I had had the drive and ambition. Sure the CEO of Kroger makes a lot of money but if you take that and divide it among all the Kroger employees it comes out to be less than a dollar a week per employee. Besides, do you really think a cashier's job is on the same level as a CEO's?
LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL. That's hilarious that you think that all CEO's start their way up from the bottom.
And that's part of the reason why we need minimum wage laws. Without such laws in place, most corporate entities would pay employees even less money and stick that extra cash in their pockets. You do have some companies out there that do the right thing by taking care of employees so that the employee productivity is high and stays high, plus the employees stick around longer and are more reliable, but most see employees as a controllable cost and executives use their position of power and control to enrich themselves while throwing the scraps to everyone underneath them. There has to be regulations and laws to keep people in check, because otherwise, a majority of the rich and powerful would seek more wealth and more power through the exploitation of those under them. It's unfortunate President Obama hasn't pushed harder to level the playing field and raise the minimum wage across the country. Get the minimum wage up to improve the quality of life for a big segment of the population while repairing, restructuring and restoring the education system so education becomes more accessible and enables those that were once making minimum wage to go to school and find a path to different career. There's a lot more that needs to be done besides raising minimum wage to address the problems in the here and now and the challenges ahead, but it would be at least one step in the right direction towards fixing what's wrong in this country.
"Make a better situation for yourself by working hard! Oh, but if you don't have a college education, we're not going to pay you much for your hard work. Go to college and better yourself and get a better job! But again we're not going to pay you that much so you need to work 3 jobs while going to school or else enjoy your mountain of debt that you'll be paying off for the majority of your life. "
You can go to school if you really want to. I pay student loans for myself and my daughter and it's not that hard to pay it back. There are grants and scholarships to help. Get a roommate to help with living expenses. Give up your $85 a month smart phone. If you really want something and work hard you can achieve it. But complaining like you have is part of the problem. Find the solution!
LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL. That's hilarious that you think that all CEO's start their way up from the bottom.
They don't start at the top neither. A college graduate is going to be the low man on the totem pole. Also, a person doesn't have to work their way up in the corporate world by staying at one company. You work your way up in one company to a point and then see if you can transfer that title to another company that will allow you move up even more and so on. My brother started out as an engineer at one company and now five companies later, he's the chief operations officer at the company he works for. Naturally, I can't mention the name to protect his and mine anonymity.
And that's part of the reason why we need minimum wage laws. Without such laws in place, most corporate entities would pay employees even less money and stick that extra cash in their pockets. You do have some companies out there that do the right thing by taking care of employees so that the employee productivity is high and stays high, plus the employees stick around longer and are more reliable, but most see employees as a controllable cost and executives use their position of power and control to enrich themselves while throwing the scraps to everyone underneath them. There has to be regulations and laws to keep people in check, because otherwise, a majority of the rich and powerful would seek more wealth and more power through the exploitation of those under them. It's unfortunate President Obama hasn't pushed harder to level the playing field and raise the minimum wage across the country. Get the minimum wage up to improve the quality of life for a big segment of the population while repairing, restructuring and restoring the education system so education becomes more accessible and enables those that were once making minimum wage to go to school and find a path to different career. There's a lot more that needs to be done besides raising minimum wage to address the problems in the here and now and the challenges ahead, but it would be at least one step in the right direction towards fixing what's wrong in this country.
"Make a better situation for yourself by working hard! Oh, but if you don't have a college education, we're not going to pay you much for your hard work. Go to college and better yourself and get a better job! But again we're not going to pay you that much so you need to work 3 jobs while going to school or else enjoy your mountain of debt that you'll be paying off for the majority of your life. "
You can go to school if you really want to. I pay student loans for myself and my daughter and it's not that hard to pay it back. There are grants and scholarships to help. Get a roommate to help with living expenses. Give up your $85 a month smart phone. If you really want something and work hard you can achieve it. But complaining like you have is part of the problem. Find the solution!
It's not always viable. You make it sound like everyone has an $85 smart phone, well some people don't have a smart phone because they can't afford it. Some people have family members to take care of and they can't just move in with a roommate to help with living expenses. Some people don't qualify for grants and scholarships. And even if you get grants and scholarships and get an education, that doesn't necessarily mean you're going to get a good job. So many people working with me at Kroger have college degrees, yet at Kroger they stay because they can't find anything despite their degrees.
People like you love to think that hard work is the solution for everything and if you can't succeed you must not be trying hard enough, but no, that's really not the case.
You can go to school if you really want to. I pay student loans for myself and my daughter and it's not that hard to pay it back. There are grants and scholarships to help. Get a roommate to help with living expenses. Give up your $85 a month smart phone. If you really want something and work hard you can achieve it. But complaining like you have is part of the problem. Find the solution!
Yeah, if you need a cellphone for making and receiving calls, then get one that does just that. You don't need one that has a hundred apps on it or one that takes pictures. You just need a plain and simple phone.
Here's a few more things that can be given up:
cable or satellite tv. Most of what people watch is on broadcast tv anyway and all you need for that is an antenna.
Broadband internet service. Dial up may be slow as molasses but it still works and you can get it for less than $20.00 a month.
Entertainment expenses. Going out to eat and/or seeing a movie or whatever can be very expensive. Stay at home more. Pop some popcorn and watch a movie. Even if you have to rent a movie, it's certainly a lot cheaper. Also, start taking your lunch to work rather than buying it out.
The big problem is too many people think they're entitled to all those things. Sure they're nice but you have to know how to prioritize.
You obviously don't get around the internet much if you think this qualifies as a ****storm, lol.
Then again, I sometimes wish I didn't get around as much as I do on the internet, so it's probably for the better if you don't!
It would be wrong of me to compare this "disturbance" to the might ****storms of 2channel and the likes of them.
This forum has to start somewhere, and this topic is most certainly a departure from "management hates my ass, how do I file a grievance without being a union member?".
