Mar
26
Blog Post 11 // Sheena Chin
March 26, 2015 | Leave a Comment
In the first reading of the Forbes article that criticized Nick Hanauer, I thought the writer, Tim Worstall, absolutely stuck it to the man and showed Nick who was boss. Referencing a few days ago when we watched Nick talk on the banned TED talk, I remember how disgusted I was listening to Nick humble-bragging his well-to-do lifestyle in comparison to the millions of American who make thousands of time less than he does. Of course, this wasn’t all. His main point of his speech was to assert that “taxing on the rich will decrease job creations.” In the rest of the Forbes article, Tim criticized his claim by pointing out fact-based statements that Nick had it all wrong — taxing the rich will have not affect job creations, it is taxing the return on capital that will affect job creations. Tim summarizes by saying we should have zero tax on capital investments in order to encourage people to invest and therefore, create more jobs.
In the second article by the New York Times that zeroed in on the lives of the people struggling by with low incomes, it pointed out yet another variable that we had not yet discussed in class – unpredictable scheduling. With today’s day and age in modern technology, we see that more and more companies are using top notch software to minimize costs and maximize service utility. Applicable to what I am currently learning in Management 3121, this is a very useful tool to companies. However, I was ignorant to the personal invasions these softwares could implicate. With an unpredictable schedule, it could only increase stress and problems to those who have low income households with children like Jannette Navarro.
From the McDonald’s court case summaries, it is infuriating to learn that after reading about Mrs. Navarro and her struggling as a Starbucks barista that there are others in the same situation as Mrs. Navarro who work longer hours with no overtime pay, and even more unpredictable schedules. What with all of the profits in revenue that such a large corporation like McDonald’s rakes in every year all from the service of their millions of workers across the country, it is unbelievable that workers are paid at minimum wage and even less. In New York alone, it is disturbing to read that McDonald’s wouldn’t even pay to cover the costs of uniform cleaning that they mandate for all of their workers.
In the last reading from the Washington Post, it reported on a court case that involved Amazon company. Briefly summarized, the problem that had erupted into the Supreme Court was whether or not workers should be compensated for the wait time at the end of their shifts on the security line to ensure that no products were taken out of the facility. The Supreme Court, as represented by Justice Thomas, concluded that workers should not be compensated for the wait time as workers in the Amazon factory should only be compensated for the work they do packaging and delivering products, not waiting on line. However, I think this is a tough case because the wait time is actually pretty long, an estimation of about 25 minutes at the end of the work day. If a worker makes $9 an hour, in that 25 minutes he or she remains at the facility could mean an extra $4-5 to take home. For low income workers, that is a significant change.
In these readings tonight, I learned a lot about job creations and how the lower income Americans struggle with menial jobs with even more menial pay that larger corporations seem to take advantage of. I agree with Tim’s argument against Nick’s claim, one of which I was very skeptical of from the very beginning. From reading about the Americans who cannot even venture to make investments, it is interesting to learn the different struggles that may arise.
