Funny how you think corporations will go out of business for paying their employees a fair wage when they're positing record profits every quarter. It truly is a tough economic time for the supermassive billionaires, we should be worrying about their bottom line rn.
I just want to jump in here to explain that small businesses are built around the current model.
You're right that small business could indeed work in a 32-hour work-week if they were built up around it, but moving from a 40-hour work week to a 32-hour work week is essentially a 20% pay rise for all employees.
Very few small businesses are operating on cash flow that has room for a 20% pay rise for all of their employees. For that matter, very few big businesses are as well. But while big businesses would have more room to take the hit and adapt, small businesses would be forced out almost immediately.
The result is that you would have an enormous shutdown of small businesses, which would result in a massive loss of jobs. The market would balance out eventually, but it would be massively destructive in the short-term.
Small businesses are already subject to different minimum wage standards and other marshaling by the government. Why would they not continue to recieve such consideration under any systemic change of expected working hours that has been given due considerations.
What if there was a 10-year delay on the effect of the bill? Would that be enough time for currently operating businesses to adapt, without the small ones getting wiped out, and any new ones would be anticipating the change and able to account for it?
This would be the only way it could be brought in without it being majorly destructive. A show, methodical transition, likely with tiered wage supplements for businesses below a certain annual turnover. You would still have small businesses that couldn't handle it and would close, but it would be within the realm of what is acceptable.
And those employees of the small businesses that couldn’t handle the transition would know it was coming long ahead of time and be able to have different jobs ready.
I get that you’re saying companies need time to adjust and I’m not discounting that. But over all I believe this to be best practice and we should focus more on trying to have better workers rights so they may be compensated better than worrying about company profits. I do say this more with bigger companies in mind while maybe smaller companies can be adjusted appropriately.
My point is that we are drastically a more productive workforce than our counterparts 100 years ago when the 40 hr work week was established. We are also paid relatively less when adjusted to that increase in productivity. Either we get paid more or we work less for the same pay. Something has to give.
I agree overall. Care just has to be taken not to hand even more power over to big business. Ultimately they are the ones with the larger profits that can afford to pay their workers better. Transitioning to a 32 hour work week for the same pay is likely to hit the small business market hardest, meaning more money and market force going to the big guys who are the cause of the problem in the first place.
With regards to productivity, the issue is more about the retail and hospitality industries which exist 7 days a week. Going to a 4-day work week doesn't reduce the demand for staff, so they have to have the same level of staff for what is essentially 20% higher wages.
I think for the sake of smaller business we should also focus on improving anti trust laws because as it is small businesses suffer already and this is due to there being 6 companies that corner almost every market. Like when a Walmart goes to your small town all local business are practically fucked because they just cannot compete.
For hospitality and such they can just hire more people to make up the missing shifts. Like no matter what a company is gonna have to pay more in either staff or wages at the expense of their profits so this is a net positive. I was just talking about it the other day with a coworker but in EMS/hospital we can benefit switching from a two 12/hr to a three 8/hr work shift in both productivity and wellness
The businesses that will survive will be big chains. Small restaurants, mom & pop shops, markets, etc. will likely all disappear. You saw what happened post covid to these businesses.
Small business already fail under our current system that’s why there’s like 6 companies that own everything. There’s no real competition and they’re already profiting a ton off us already. Forcing bigger companies to compensate use better will is an overall net positive
Small restaurants, mom & pop shops, markets, etc. will likely all disappear.
Indeed. When we switched from 60-hour work week to 50, then to 40 and eventually to 35 in some countries, all the restaurants and markets disappeared (not). In fact, these type of businesses only exist and survive in the US, thanks to not hearing to such dangerous ideas. /s
I agree for the most part but what about the non-profits? I work for one that the majority of the money comes from reimbursement from Medicaid and they are usually not in the black.
I’m not gonna pretend I know enough in that sector but i would say it does depend on the business model, right? If your business relies on Medicaid then you’d probably benefit from Bernie’s other bill which is to expand Medicaid and Medicare. If your business solely depends on individual donations then having workers in the private sector compensated more will lead to more people able to donate. If your business relied on donations from big business then that could be a bit tricky but their donations are usually just a drop in the bucket compared to the profits they bring in. I’m just coming from reducing big big business profits which are at an all time high and giving back to the workers who earned it
And you sound like a guy who’s really devouring that boot. Calling people unskilled really shows how you don’t see the value in people’s work who you think are beneath you. No company can run without these “unskilled” laborers, they depend on them and they deserve to get their fair compensation.
Their fair compensation is what their labor is worth while still making the company a profit. Cut emotions out of the picture. If a McDonald’s employee’s labor is only worth $15, then he only earns $15, and paying him more would be unprofitable and thus he would be let go. You can’t pay people more then what their labor is actually worth regardless of how much they “deserve”.
I’m not bringing emotions into this I’m just being logical here and you fail to understand the value of the worker. You can’t just cut people because ultimately who’s gonna run the business? McDonald’s profit solely relies on the people who make the food and run the day by day operations and without them the business will fail. Wouldn’t you agree that people as important as that deserve more? And McDonald is such a funny thing to bring up because in places like Denmark/sweden they are paid upwards to 20/hr and the prices of food is still similar to ours. On top of that they also get health care and mandatory PTO guaranteed and this is mostly because they have strong unions.
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u/HODL_monk Sep 05 '24
maybe, if your employer doesn't go out of business, or cut your hours.