Most people will give thanks for their Thanksgiving dinner to God and to the preparers. Consider all the others who helped make your dinner possible.
First, consider the people who built the roads for you to get to the store and all those who paid taxes for those roads, both now and long ago.
Consider the people at the grocery store who stocked the shelves, coolers, and freezers with all the food you bought and who checked you out and bagged your groceries.
Consider the people who drove the trucks on the above-mentioned roads to deliver the food to the grocery store.
Consider the people in the warehouses who unloaded the goods from one set of trucks coming from processors, stacked them, and then loaded them on another set of trucks for delivery to local stores.
Consider the people who drove the trucks on the above-mentioned roads to deliver the goods to a warehouse. Sometimes they are driving long hours under a deadline.
Consider the people who processed the food at a cannery, a packager, or a slaughterhouse. Many of them work under conditions and wages you wouldn’t tolerate.
Consider the people who drove the trucks on the above-mentioned roads to deliver the produce or animals to a cannery, a packager, or a slaughterhouse.
Consider the state and federal inspectors who try to enforce those “burdensome” regulations so that you have safe food, uncontaminated by unwanted organisms and chemicals.
Consider the environmentalists who want to reduce the contaminants in our air and water that could make your food less healthy.
Consider the people who picked the fruit and vegetables that are on your Thanksgiving table. Some of them worked in air-conditioned harvester cabs; others of them picked by hand so long that they wondered if they could stand straight at the end of the day. Some of them owned the land they worked and kept any profits. Some worked seasonally at wages you wouldn’t tolerate.
Consider the people who ran the farms. Some of them were corporate managers and some of them were resident farmer-owners. These latter took many risks to produce your food besides the general risk of physical injury. Was the weather going to be just right to give a great crop? Were the market prices going to be favorable enough to pay their bank loans and still have money left over to live on until the next crops came in?
Consider the local bankers who made many of the loans to farmers. Did they evaluate the risk properly so that the bank would have enough profit to continue the next year? Now savings account interest is a joke, but when it was a decent return would the banker have enough profit to pass on to his or her savings customers?
Consider all those who contribute indirectly to your having an enjoyable meal.
If the weather is bad, consider all the snowplow operators who work long, weird hours so that you or your guests could get safely to wherever your Thanksgiving meal will be.
Consider the police who are out patrolling while you travel or are eating.
Consider the firefighters who may have to jump up from their meal at moment’s notice because somebody knocked over a candle or burned themselves with hot food.
Consider the complexity behind some of our simple pleasures. Without the efforts of hundreds and thousands of people we may never meet, we would have to go out ourselves to grow and harvest what we enjoy in good company in a warm house.
Also posted on the Reader Weekly website at http://duluthreader.com/articles/2013/11/21/2479_party_of_one-6.
Showing posts with label servers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label servers. Show all posts
Saturday, November 23, 2013
Tuesday, July 06, 2010
A tip for Tom Emmer on wait staff pay
Tom Emmer, Republican candidate for Minnesota Governor, wants the minimum wage lowered for service workers who get lots of tips. See "Emmer: Lower wages for tipped workers", Jackie Crosby, Star Tribune, 2010-07-06. He says that the extra wages are taking money from customers. Is he also calling for CEOs with large bonuses to get a lower base pay? After all, these CEOs are also taking money from customers.
His arguments are also weak on other points.
He uses as an example the Eagle Street Grill in downtown St. Paul where "three servers take home over $100,000 a year, including tips."
Do each of the servers take home $100,000 a year or do three servers take home $100,000 a year among them. In the latter case, $33,000 may be a good income for many servers, but many others would like to get that much. If a server receives lots of tips, doesn't that mean they are providing good service to their customers. If they are providing good service to their customers, aren't many of these repeat customers and probably even buying a lot of food and drink. If the customers are buying a lot, the restaurant owners should be very happy to have highly-paid servers.
How many times have you gone into a restaurant where the server has not asked if you want drinks before dinner, has not asked if you want wine with dinner, and has given you a bill without even asking if you want coffee or dessert? Even if the answer will be no, a good server always asks these questions. The server who does will generate more revenue for the restaurant and will get a bigger tip. Oh, but that is taking money from the customers.
If you want to see more realistic figures, see "Tom Emmer goes after food server wages", Rachel Hutton, City Pages, 2010-07-06. She blows lots of the "facts" that Emmer states out of the water. An even better analysis is "Servers, wait staff unlikely to make $100,000", Annie Baxter, Minnesota Public Radio, 2010-07-06, 2010-07-06.
I could go on and on picking apart the arguments of the likes of Tom Emmer, but I'll end with just two.
One was mentioned in Baxter's argument comparing wait staff during slow times to that of sales persons. Many sales persons still get a base pay for getting out there and trying. Do CEOs get a lower base salary when sales are low?
Remember Circuit City. It laid off its highest paid sales staff and went downhill from there. It was the highest paid sales staff that people went to for answers. If they got good answers, they bought. The lower paid staff didn't always have the answers and so fewer people bought stuff from Circuit City. The high-paid servers are generating a lot of sales for their restaurants. Don't knock them!
Other references:
"Circuit City cost cutting madness", Andrew Weir
"How the Mighty Fall", Jim Collins. It is ironic that he mentioned Circuit City in his previous book, "Good to Great". Is there a lesson for Minnesota here?
His arguments are also weak on other points.
He uses as an example the Eagle Street Grill in downtown St. Paul where "three servers take home over $100,000 a year, including tips."
Do each of the servers take home $100,000 a year or do three servers take home $100,000 a year among them. In the latter case, $33,000 may be a good income for many servers, but many others would like to get that much. If a server receives lots of tips, doesn't that mean they are providing good service to their customers. If they are providing good service to their customers, aren't many of these repeat customers and probably even buying a lot of food and drink. If the customers are buying a lot, the restaurant owners should be very happy to have highly-paid servers.
How many times have you gone into a restaurant where the server has not asked if you want drinks before dinner, has not asked if you want wine with dinner, and has given you a bill without even asking if you want coffee or dessert? Even if the answer will be no, a good server always asks these questions. The server who does will generate more revenue for the restaurant and will get a bigger tip. Oh, but that is taking money from the customers.
If you want to see more realistic figures, see "Tom Emmer goes after food server wages", Rachel Hutton, City Pages, 2010-07-06. She blows lots of the "facts" that Emmer states out of the water. An even better analysis is "Servers, wait staff unlikely to make $100,000", Annie Baxter, Minnesota Public Radio, 2010-07-06, 2010-07-06.
I could go on and on picking apart the arguments of the likes of Tom Emmer, but I'll end with just two.
One was mentioned in Baxter's argument comparing wait staff during slow times to that of sales persons. Many sales persons still get a base pay for getting out there and trying. Do CEOs get a lower base salary when sales are low?
Remember Circuit City. It laid off its highest paid sales staff and went downhill from there. It was the highest paid sales staff that people went to for answers. If they got good answers, they bought. The lower paid staff didn't always have the answers and so fewer people bought stuff from Circuit City. The high-paid servers are generating a lot of sales for their restaurants. Don't knock them!
Other references:
"Circuit City cost cutting madness", Andrew Weir
"How the Mighty Fall", Jim Collins. It is ironic that he mentioned Circuit City in his previous book, "Good to Great". Is there a lesson for Minnesota here?
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