Availability kills value bro
this post was submitted on 18 May 2026
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thats the point
Wife of a friend argues that "burger flippers" shouldn't earn enough money. She agrees there's a market for burgers and that the jobs need to be filled, but the people shouldn't be compensated for their time. You can't change her mind.
"It's what the market will bare"
Burger Flippers Unionize, drive up wages
"They're making my burgers too expensive!!!"
There's isn't even an actual relationship between paying people more money and the price of the product to an individual. Not like that at least, and especially not with high volume fast food where the amount of time an employee takes to make a single unit is neglegible.
Big Macs in the Netherlands are in the same ballpark as in the US, price wise, despite higher wages for "buger flippers" and better overall benefits, job security and working conditions.
There’s isn’t even an actual relationship between paying people more money and the price of the product to an individual.
That's broadly true. But end customers can't see the business balance sheets. So when wages go up at the same time as inflation, they do the Milton Friedman Econ 101 thing and blame wage earners for price spikes regardless of the reality.
Big Macs in the Netherlands are in the same ballpark as in the US, price wise, despite higher wages for “buger flippers” and better overall benefits, job security and working conditions.
I remember that staistic from decades ago. I wonder if it still holds true. The Dutch have been undergoing their own neoliberal fleecing of late. Rents are skyrocketing. Deregulation and union busting has taken their toll.
I remember that staistic from decades ago. I wonder if it still holds true. The Dutch have been undergoing their own neoliberal fleecing of late. Rents are skyrocketing. Deregulation and union busting has taken their toll.
According to some cursory googling it is. But you are also correct with the rest you're saying here ofcourse.
The relationship is just one they create artificially because American business has devolved into essentially finding any excuse you can to jack up the price
Big Macs in the Netherlands are in the same ballpark as in the US, price wise
Are they the same size though? Isn't everything in America ~~fatter~~ bigger?
I'm working off of the assumption they are, but you could be on to something.
Oh, do they also hit you with the "it's not meant to be a permanent full-time job, just for kids breaking into the work force for some pocket money" type shit? As if the supply of teenagers wanting to be exploited for pennies is infinite, while the lead is a 47-year-old who's been there for 12 years and gotten $5 in raises?
Oh absolutely.
I've yet to see a high school that has classes between 10pm and 6am, though.
Yeah that's the talk show propaganda line. Designed to make the idiots feel good that they're better than the burger flippers.
We look at it and go, well who makes the money then the corporations? the CEO's? They say well they earned it, and we write them off as a lost cause.
And ofc she wants to make it big. Get a huge valuation on a company with just a potential customer base (Google, M$ etc will all be paying her!) in six months and then sell. She asked me to invest. I declined.
I work with people like this. The next sentence is always some variant of “if they don’t want to be poor they should get a better job. “
Yeah dumbass, there’s 100 million 6-figure jobs available for everyone to not be poor. And education that doesn’t put you 6 figures in debt. They should work harder than the 2 jobs they’re already working and Ubering on the side, you say? They’re already doing 4x as much as your privileged fat ass sitting behind a desk who knocks off early on a Friday.
Fuck I hate people sometimes.
You have a great point.
100 million 6-figure jobs available for everyone to not be poor
While "100 million" was likely made up, there are 8.3 billion people on earth. Those 100 million jobs are enough for 1/83 of the population.
Everyone should just work hard and become middle-managers instead of complaining about low wages.
- a conservative who used to argue with me online
At the same time they were probably arguing to pay the entry level less and by proxy setting themselves up to povery even as middle mangers.
Well the water is rising fast, but there's still ladder above me, go ahead and open the valve some more!
So he cleans the trash then?
I doubt he showers.
The secret ingredient is crime
Unironicaly, I believe people do this to get ahead, and that is the only way people make it out.
No one should have to work multiple jobs to "just get by." In fact, your survival shouldn't be tied to wage slavery.
I agree with the argument but there is one undue assumption : Maybe they don't agree the job is necessary.
Maybe they don’t agree the job is necessary.
If you're patroning the business, you are implicitly conceding the necessity.
I'll spot you there's a plethora of Bullshit Jobs, but they are far more likely to be bureaucratic policing or saturation marketing than retail food service.
They don't tell rich people who do unnecessary jobs to go do something productive instead.
No they're producing money that's like pure value and stuff doing. You need to download more ram my guy.
Ohh it's not necessary, it can be automated. Then a tablet can take the order/payment. then you don't need managers.
Cleaning, Maintenance, and Unemployment. That's what our grandchildren will be left with. And maybe not cleaning if the design is done well enough.
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My family of MAGAts keep insisting that unskilled labor shouldn't be paid a living wage.
And fail to see the flaws in that logic.
Not really. While, yes, the job usually is necessary, telling someone to get a better job does not imply that their current one is necessary.
No person working a full time job should be poor. And a 20hr per week job should be able to comfortably split the median rent of a 2 bedroom apartment with another working adult and offer at least a basic lifestyle.
I don't give a fuck about judging if a job is necessary or not. If a buisness needs a job filled then they have to pay enough for people to live
Every shitty job is necessary to somebody to some degree or no one would pay for it.
It comes down to this. If you want something to be done by someone, but you also dont think people that do that thing that you want should be paid enough to live a decent life, then you are evil. Period.
Enabling mass-migration into rich countries just means brown people will become the new underclass, enabling just more racism.
Enabling mass-migration into rich countries just means brown people will become the new underclass
Only true for societies with job shortages, which hasn't been the case for most of history and is quite unique to capitalism. In a socialist society with full employment, mass migration would be more than welcome, as socialists understand that labor is the source of value and the means to betterment of society.
I'm team automation, BTW. No need to create a new underclass of brown people.
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