I recently had a visit at local Mc D's and noticed a hefty burger price hike posted next to $14.00 per hour starting pay. yes, they're hiring.

So.....I asked a young worker about that, you know $14.00 per hour starting pay for flipping burgers and she said...

"it's a stressful job."

It's not the flipping burgers that's stressful, it's dealing with the customers.

And probably doing 2-3 peoples jobs.

I get it. When grilling burgers at home I wine the entire time to offset the stress.

quote:

Originally posted by SPWAMike0317:
I get it. When grilling burgers at home I wine the entire time to offset the stress.

I see what you did there.........

PC

Saw this last week in Philadelphia suburbs. Went inside to pick up my mobile order and the manager was the one working the "pickup" counter. I asked her about it-- curiosity-- and she said that a) She couldn't hire enough at that, or probably most any other rate, b) If I knew anyone who was interested, she could start them next-day if they came in before noon the prior day for an interview (she needed to set up payroll, uniforms, etc the same afternoon) and b) they'd get pretty much any number of hours they wanted.

Basic requirements: Relatively awake, not currently high, does not need a lot of remedial "personal sanitation" help, not presently illegal, not presently a fugitive. Pretty much anything else she could work with.

I didn't have an opportunity to take a picture of the "Homeless, anything will help, God Bless" panhandler not more than 20 yards away.

$14 here plus $1,000 sign on bonus.

I worked at McDonald’s for a week in college. A week. My direct supervisor was a classmate from highschool. She was inbred and looked like a cartoon character, and she got teased and bullied mercilessly in high school. I never gave her a hard time, but since I was part of the sports crowd, she took this as an opportunity to pay back all the built up angst and rage from those days of abuse, and I got it all. Getting slur-screamed at by someone who is cross-eyed and drooling sucks. But it was just a little extra seasoning on top of how horrible and shitty that job was. Managing a music store, stocking inventory, handling payroll and the schedule, doing deposits, dealing with maintaining instruments, doing repairs, and going weeks without pay during the lean times while hustling for every sale we could just to keep the lights on was less stressful than working in that broiling shithole of a kitchen.

The management treats you with utter indifference because you’re replaceable and just run a semi-automated system that requires no skills or intelligence and they’ll remind you of this. Customers treat you worse, you’re subhuman to them at best and at worst, the cause of everything wrong in their life because goddamit, they wanted a ten piece McNugget with BBQ sauce NOT RANCH and their soda has TOO MUCH ICE IN IT. This, with an unwavering urgency and pressure to do everything as quickly as you can, and mistakes are not tolerated by either the low-class customers or the even lower-class management.

Yeah, it’s stressful. I’m not arguing for fifteen dollars an hour, I’m arguing for the whole thing getting automated, it would be better for humanity as a whole. I went back to washing dishes at the college eatery instead for the same pay and felt like I was getting away with something.

I did McDonald’s for 10 years as a District Manager. The pressure to meet unrealistic sales and labor plans, the expectation of 90 second drive thru times…I could go on-and-on.

Restaurant work at any level is stressful as hell, everything flows downhill, to include the kid flipping burgers. His ability to send out a quality product can make or break a customer survey - get a bad one? You might as well be in USMC boot camp again. Everyone is punished.

Nothing but respect from me to those in the service industry.

quote:

Originally posted by bobtheelf:
It's not the flipping burgers that's stressful, it's dealing with the customers.

quote:

Originally posted by Voshterkoff:
And probably doing 2-3 peoples jobs.

These two things right here.

My job isn't that hard either, but there's no real break, coworkers are unreliable, the management is retarded/high on coke, I end up having to do 5 things at once, and all have to be completed now, and then there's the "customers", these drivers who don't listen to me, or don't speak English, and don't know what they're actually doing there except "pickup". Pickup what, I don't know, and neither do they, a quarter of the time they're not even at the right location.

All these little parts add up to make one big shit sandwich.

quote:

Originally posted by SPWAMike0317:
I get it. When grilling burgers at home I wine the entire time to offset the stress.

With the price of beef, I even stress about screwing up hamburgers on the grill. Don't get me started on hot dogs.

Wow! This retirement gig that I'm doing now sounds better all the time.

My last trip to a fast food joint convinced me that I can drive to the store, park wherever, hike through the store to purchase everything I need, drive home, fire up the grill, and make myself a burger in less time and half the price.

OK, I won't get to admire the check-out clerk's newest square foot or so of obnoxious tattoos. I can live without that.

An endless repetitive task, under time pressure? If I tried it there'd be hamburgers stuck to the ceiling.

quote:

Originally posted by bobtheelf:
It's not the flipping burgers that's stressful, it's dealing with the customers.

I didn't do the burger flipping but I did work at a Pizza joint in the kitchen making them, and it was hot as fuck, and when it got busy, yeah it was stressful.

Then later I worked as a busboy which wasn't bad unless the manager was freaking out. Then a host and that wasn't bad as long as there wasn't a wait, because then the manager would freak out. Then as a waiter, and yes that was stressful as fuck because you always had those whiny bitches, in a bad mood, and purposely went to a restaurant so they could take it out on somebody. I made $2 an hour (IIRC it was $2.35) so the entire job was dependent on tips. My customers always had what they ordered, cooked to their exact requirements. They never had a glass of any liquid reach the bottom of the glass, and even then it was hard to average 15%. A certain type of customers would come in, and you'd be lucky to get 2%, or anything at all.

If you have ever seen the movie Waiting, it's 100% accurate. The film came out years after i was done with that business and couldn't believe a comedy could be so accurate.

quote:

Originally posted by LoboGunLeather:
Wow! This retirement gig that I'm doing now sounds better all the time.

Man, you got that right!

Every time I get to thinking "Maybe a part-time job to feed my hobbies...?" I read Tales From The Job Front and think "Yeah, I don't need more toys that badly" and drop the idea.

Who would've thought working behind the counter at McDonald's, of all places, could be that bad?

It's worth a lot, more than $15/hr. It's hot, greasy, fast paced, shitty work.

Most jobs are grossly underpaid and most people's ideas of what makes sense is all fucked up and intertwined with survivor bias and jealousy and dreams of riches and such.

Jobs that aren't worth enough to live on shouldn't even exist, really. Bring on the fast food robots and quit underpaying humans to exploit them for bullshit jobs just so snot ridden kids can get cheap shitty food through a drive through.

these types of jobs were never intended to provide living wages. they were originally for part time or people new to the work world to earn some money for school, spending or whatever while they got work experience.

quote:

Originally posted by nasig:
these types of jobs were never intended to provide living wages.

Except for perhaps the management positions: Yup.

quote:

Originally posted by bobtheelf:
it's dealing with the customers.

Even as an emergency services dispatcher that was the worst part of the job.
Trying to do things right in a critical situation was the actual stress, but the satisfaction of the outcome as the adrenalin wore off made it worthwhile. Dealing with the alpha hotels in the public, though, was what left me seriously thinking of quitting at the end of countless days from my first shift to the last 12 years later.

I worked at a McD's a gazzillion years ago when I was in high School . It WAS stressful . We were expected to show up on time , follow orders , and work hard . We only had one dickhead manager . The rest were ok .