WTF People... GET A LIFE!!!

[Andyman]

As long as people keep going to stores on these days they will be open. Why turn away good business?

Actually, because it's unproductive.

The fallacy here is that if stores are open it will add to business, and that's not always true. What it does is dilute sales by spreading the volume out over a great time frame and is actually less productive and more expensive. Retail sales volume, like many sales volumes, is not a function of hours of operation in most cases; you usually don't get 10% sales increase by being open another hour. Taco Bell staying open till 2AM to feed the drunks may be an exception, but lots of that is just a shift of dollars away from pizza joints and 7-11s; the market is generally the same.

If stores closed on Sunday like they used to be, your total retail dollars would probably remain the same, but sales/hour would increase, as would throughput and productivity. Hours would be lost for employees as there would be no work on Sunday, but that would be partially made up by the increased business needs the other six days. Unfortunately, some jobs would be lost as the efficiencies of scale would cause increased production.

But, retail is loaded with lemmings and if one does something "innovative", well the others all soon follow suit...

 

[tentoze]

God Bless Taco Bell.

 

[Andyman]

:lmao:

 

[mulester7]

Taco Bell staying open till 2AM to feed the drunks

.....and railroaders.....

God Bless Taco Bell.

.....:lmao::lmao::lmao:.....

 

[fotno]

There have been a number of valid points made in this thread on both sides of the argument, but they bring a couple thoughts to mind:

I hear some of you saying; "What about the importance of the Holiday?" and "Aren't we robbing people of time with their families?" or "Things didn't used to be this way, businesses are monopolizing their employee's time". I would argue that we have more leisure time in this country nowadays, not less, than ever before.

My Grandfather rose from bed at 4:30AM every day of his life, fed his livestock, milked his cows, and then built houses Monday through Saturday with only Sunday to rest. When he got home, bent nearly double from a day of; "his ass hanging off a rafter", he tended his garden till dusk through the growing season, ate his supper and was in bed by 9:00PM. A day of working like he did would kill most of us. He did these things to feed his family, and I can't recall ever hearing him complain about it. He celebrated when the work was done, and not before. I remember him unloading a flat-bed truck full of 50lb feed bags when I was little (he was 65 or so), and when he got to the last bag saying; "Well there's the one I was looking for!"

Another thing I can't recall is ever hiring on to a job, that I wasn't informed before I starting work, exactly what was expected of me. I have always been of the mindset that as long as my employer paid my wages, and didn't ask me to do anything that was against the law or my own ethics, the time they paid for was theirs. I always tried to show up on time, in a good state of mind, and ready to work; and I've done everything from shoveling horse manure and digging ditches, to melting the soles of my shoes off roofing houses in 100˚+ southern summers, to announcing radio programming, customer service and selling construction supplies.

I'm not to lie and say that I haven't felt exactly the way Simi does about having to work when others don't. I have worked many a holiday and fussed about it. But as I grow older I have learned to appreciate that being able to do a good hard days work, earn a decent wage with my labor and sweat, and still go home in one piece is quite a reward in itself.

 

[merrylander]

I always gave a good eight hours each day because that was what I was paid for. In emergencies I was there, on one occasion I walked 15 miles to the switching centre because the power wires into the house were hanging so low over the driveway that I could not get the car out, all the result of an ice storm.

That said what really gets my goat are the companies that demand 10 or 12 hour days "because we have to get this widget to market now" but don't pay for the extra hours. I can tell you from my computer programming days that working beyond a ten hour day is counter-productive because you start making mistakes that take all of the next day to find - what we used to call the "mythical manhour". Young engineers that I have worked with said they did this "because we are professionals". Well so are some of the ladies down on 14th street and they don't work for free.

 

[Andyman]

I hear some of you saying; "What about the importance of the Holiday?" and "Aren't we robbing people of time with their families?" or "Things didn't used to be this way, businesses are monopolizing their employee's time". I would argue that we have more leisure time in this country nowadays, not less, than ever before.

I don't know about that....

My Dad worked as a salaried engineer M-F 40 hours and my mother worked retail later for some niceties. Now it seems like the two wage earner job is the standard and often that's not enough as the huge credit card indebtedness is testimony to. Personally, I work 40 at work and then other hours scrounging and flipping for anything beyond the basics, as does my wife, who can't work normal jobs due to multiple physical issues.

The days of a single 40 hour wage earner being able to support a family are long gone in almost all cases, and certainly for the average Joe.

 

[tentoze]

Well so are some of the ladies down on 14th street and they don't work for free.

Check PM's. Need beeper #'s.

 

[Bstable]

I don't know about that....


The days of a single 40 hour wage earner being able to support a family are long gone in almost all cases, and certainly for the average Joe.

IMHO..you are comparing apples to oranges.....supporting a family to me is putting a roof over your head, feeding and maintaining your health etc. Today people tend to :

A. Try to put too much of a roof over their head (see current crisis)
B. Not take the time too prepare their own meals (see fast food)
C. Not eat healthier self prepared meals and overeat (see fast food)
D. Buy the latest (time saving or just for entertainment) type of gadget

My drift is simply that we no longer do for ourselves things that people did as a way of life back when. Now our paychecks are stretched to pay cell phone bills, cable, internet, food delivery to our front door, etc.....People today are accustomed to their lifestyle, and consider a $20 pizza delivered to their lazy-boy twice a week as a "cost of living". Convenience and gadgets are not always necessary and they do cost $$$$$.

 

[Andyman]

I won't disagree with those points, but it is tough to get by one a single wage.

My home is modest in a modest neighborhood, we drive older cars, the "new" one is a 2002, and I scrounge LOTS of stuff from thrifts and garage sales, including most of my clothes. I could save about $200-250/month by dropping cable, cell phones, selling a car, and maybe making the family eat more responsibly, but it still would be hard to cover the bills with my wages alone. Yet our standard of living compares well with those making $20-30,000 more annually because we don't follow the crowd and try to keep up with the Joneses, much to my 14 year old daughters dismay

 

[fotno]

I don't know about that....

My Dad worked as a salaried engineer M-F 40 hours and my mother worked retail later for some niceties. Now it seems like the two wage earner job is the standard and often that's not enough as the huge credit card indebtedness is testimony to. Personally, I work 40 at work and then other hours scrounging and flipping for anything beyond the basics, as does my wife, who can't work normal jobs due to multiple physical issues.

The days of a single 40 hour wage earner being able to support a family are long gone in almost all cases, and certainly for the average Joe.

My Grandmother worked a full time job herself. 40+ hours a week in a sock factory, raised 5 children, and a 2 acre garden besides. Leisure time was a foreign concept to her. The only day of the week they didn't work from daylight till dark was Sunday. I've seen that grand lady work for weeks canning her vegetables, and hoe the weeds out of her garden until she could barely stand.

My point in the proceeding comments was not that people don't work long hours these days, but that much of the work that we do is for reasons our parents and grandparents wouldn't even recognize. My Grandparents raised their children in a 1,400 square foot house that my Grandfather built with $1,000 in materials, and an ungodly amount of back-breaking, nearly single handed labor. They didn't work all those hours so that they could have a home theater, or leather upholstery in their luxury car, they did it to survive. To my knowledge they never bought a single thing on credit, or owned a new car. If they didn't have the money in hand for a purchase they just did without.

I'm not trying to lessen the burdens of our modern society, they can be immense and overwhelming. I'm just saying that those older folks had nearly every problem we have and a few more besides, and for the most part they handled it by throwing their chins out and persevering. I have sat thinking about this for quite a while now, and for the life of me I don't remember ever hearing them complain about it. Matter of fact, I remember them being thankful for what they did have. As a child when I would complain about some toy or trinket my Mother couldn't buy for me, my Grandmother's response was always the same; "Son, you're old enough your 'wants' won't kill you".

 

[fropiler]

For the love of walking uphill both ways...

Thankfully, times have changed.

 

[fotno]

Care to enlighten us on any changes you feel are for the better?

 

[Cosmic]

I have worked free-lance, as a broadcast TV cameraman, for about 20 years now. Corporate events, news, plus sometimes getting the chance to produce something myself (and no weddings .)

I am not 'on call' per se, but, being free-lance, in a sense you are always on call; it just depends when the phone rings.
Week-ends to me mean two days in a row without work. If it ain't Sat/Sun, it's fine if it's Tue/Wed.

I am good at what I do; I know this because in my work, at the end of the day, you have either done well or you have not, and it is immediately apparent both on the tape and in the attitudes when people say goodbye.
I take great pleasure in helping out and giving more than just my eye to the camera, whether I am taping a routine lecture at a hotel or Ted Koppel doing an interview. I will give whatever it takes to make a project as good as circumstances allow, and I have worked some killer hours along the way.

However, a lot of folks would take one look at me and my wife and the small place we live in, and go 'not much of a career, obviously' and from a purely income perspective, they'd be right. I 'll never be rich in money. Having gone through addiction, and now staying on the straight and narrow, I know this has had an impact. I have no insurance, so my insurance is staying healthy as best I can.

However, there is always good home-cooked food on the table, we pay our bills, and friends like us for not being shop-talking "gotta-go" types when we are at parties.

And, in terms of wealth, I can say this: the people I have worked with in the past 20 years will still come up and shake hands with me (I have met enough of them over the years to know this.)
Not because I have been a doormat and a yes-man, but because I have come in prepared, and with both a sense of humor and a sense of when to tell them 'no', for their own good.

There is a an attitude here of 'you are your job' which I think can be destructive to people who perhaps have self-esteem issues, and for whom the man in the mirror only looks good in the office.

Working hard comes with pride in self and skills, as so many have mentioned here; without balance in your life, however, it all is moot. You will burn one way or the other, either from stress at work, or from dissatisfaction at what you don't have.

Let's hope 2009 brings better days for us all.

C.

 

[fropiler]

Care to enlighten us on any changes you feel are for the better?

Us?

If I have to point out all the things in life that are better now than they were in the "good old days" well, I don't have the time. So I guess the answer is No.

Nor do I have the inclination. I like life in it's present form and shouldn't have to explain or defend that to anyone.

If I've misread your tone, I apologize.

Let me add to this - I'm not trying to take anything away from the idea that hard work is a virtue. I had grandparents too, and they worked their rear ends off just like yours did. My grandparents worked that much harder because they HAD to. They would be sad if they were to find that no progress had been made in all these years. Much of those efforts were directed at making life a little easier for folks - hence, airplanes and cars instead of horses and feet. Multi-row combines instead of a donkey and a hoe. Progress.

and back to the point at hand, it still sucks to be on call. You can't put lipstick on a pager.

 

[AU20K]

What gets my goat about this is, It's a paid holiday, and there is no need to be working. The person working will get no extra pay for working because it is a firm holiday, and there is no reason any person in the firm should be working other than myself, or the IT engineer. Reasons such as an exchange crash, or similar. Mail still has to be able to make it into the firm even if no one is reading it.

If a person just feels the need to HAVE to work, then so be it, but if it was me, and I had a problem, I would say OH well, and wait until tomorrow to contact the IT department. I could never feel right pulling a person from their holiday especially not knowing if they are with family or what on a paid holiday that the firm tells u there is no need to be working....

I guess since I think about what others are doing with their holiday, I could never feel self centered enough to pull someone else away from their special day just because I have nothing else to do other than work. Believe me. This person has no need to be working other than they must be bored.

I feel for them if that is the case, and would invite them over for dinner since they must not be with, or have family, but they live about 4 hours away and are in the main office.

I guess consideration is my main point.. not so much having to work...

You all make good points,, including the ones above. My suggestion is to tell these things to the person who generated the help call and see if he/she simply doesn't get it or what.

my $.02

 

[Aage]

You all make good points,, including the ones above. My suggestion is to tell these things to the person who generated the help call and see if he/she simply doesn't get it or what.

my $.02

And then buff up your resumé, 'cause you'll be a-needing it...

 

[fotno]

Us?

If I have to point out all the things in life that are better now than they were in the "good old days" well, I don't have the time. So I guess the answer is No.

Nor do I have the inclination. I like life in it's present form and shouldn't have to explain or defend that to anyone.

If I've misread your tone, I apologize.

Let me add to this - I'm not trying to take anything away from the idea that hard work is a virtue. I had grandparents too, and they worked their rear ends off just like yours did. My grandparents worked that much harder because they HAD to. They would be sad if they were to find that no progress had been made in all these years. Much of those efforts were directed at making life a little easier for folks - hence, airplanes and cars instead of horses and feet. Multi-row combines instead of a donkey and a hoe. Progress.

and back to the point at hand, it still sucks to be on call. You can't put lipstick on a pager.

I'm not asking you to defend your convictions, just to point out a few examples. You're making my point for me, which is: Life was far harder then. But harder does not automatically mean worse.

 

[fropiler]

Ok.

I'm not asking you to defend your convictions, just to point out a few examples. You're making my point for me, which is: Life was far harder then. But harder does not automatically mean worse.

1. It was harder for your Grandmother than it was for your Grandfather. He could vote.

2. I was harder if you were black than if you were white. Much harder.

There are many more "examples" of why I wouldn't want to go back. but that would be straying way off topic.

Harder doesn't have to be better or worse. Just harder.

Enjoy the current. It's all you really have.

 

[RobD8870]

I am torn on this. I have to admit that since my work is a 24/7 operation I kinda felt like saying well, "I have to work" But that is my job which I am lucky to have.

But that doesnt mean that the original poster does not have a right to complain. We all love to say "it could always be worse!!" But to me that is like saying nothing at all because it could always be better too. I battle it. I try to count my blessings but when you see others with there family it can hurt.

In the end, it is what it is. Just try to enjoy life as much as you can WHEN YOU CAN....because it is what truly only comes once. There are plenty of holidays.

Now if I can take my own advice we will be doing good!