Man I'm getting pissed

[CG32]

I recently saw in the news that there was a job fair in the dfw area that was expecting a over thousand people to show up... there was roughly 20 people total. I work it the live events industry and it will be one of the last to recover, but I have seen highly skilled professionals with 20+ years experience take jobs as a security guards, and other professions so they can make ends meet until their chosen profession recovers. I am all about unemployment for those who need it and put in the time looking for a job, but sometimes you have to make do in less than desirable situations until a better one comes along.

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[Klutch]

Thank you for the respectful replies. I have no problem with people disagreeing with me. And I believe what you are saying. However, I think your points are specific and isolated.

While we want things to go back to when we could order inexpensive Jeep parts and get them quickly, I think things will get better, but maybe not the same.

Sure, US unemployment numbers were low pre-pandemic. What those numbers didn't show was our significant underemployment problem. Envy of the world? Hardly. Envy of the Third World perhaps. You won't find many people in Western Europe, Japan, Canada, Australia or New Zealand envying the US labor situation. While their unemployment numbers might be higher, they have better pay, free health care, free college tuition, lots of vacation and retirement plans. (I'm not saying these systems would work in the US. I'm saying they have very good benefits and they like them.)

The Pandemic has broken open what was really going on. Many, many Americans were working very hard and just barely getting by or not even getting by without social programs. When most Walmart jobs are part time, minimum wage with no benefits, it is we the tax paying Jeep people who subsidize their incomes with Medicaid, SNAP, WIC, free school lunches and housing vouchers, for example. How nice for Walmart.

McDonald's jobs at $17 an hour might sound nice, but are those jobs part time with no benefits? These days, everyone knows working at McDonald's can be downright miserable with no opportunity for raises, promotions or even full time positions. So, should people take those jobs anyway?

I find it interesting that many people I talk to say we should not raise the minimum wage, we should not require employers to provide benefits and people should be happy they can get a job at all. These same people long for the "Golden Age" of the 1950s. Ironically, that Golden Age was largely due to labor unions providing good pay, good benefits and pension plans. (Yeah, unions got greedy and power hungry, but they also did a lot to improve working conditions, wages and benefits for workers.)

Thank you for sharing your perspectives. I do think this relates to Jeeping. If vendors are unable to provide new products, prompt shipping and good service, that's going to really dampen Jeep fun.

 

[IamAlan]

McDonald's jobs at $17 an hour might sound nice, but are those jobs part time with no benefits? These days, everyone knows working at McDonald's can be downright miserable with no opportunity for raises, promotions or even full time positions. So, should people take those jobs anyway?

In a word - yes. It's much easier to find a job when you have a job. And you're likely to make better decisions along the way. My daughter did her time in fast food (Starbucks), as well ass several other retail settings and it set her on a path such that she is now 34 YO and makes better than $50K. Did she have to hustle? Did she have to make sacrifices? Did she get hooked on Ramen Noodles? Damn straight she did.
And I'm proud of her for it.

 

[Klutch]

In a word - yes. It's much easier to find a job when you have a job. And you're likely to make better decisions along the way. My daughter did her time in fast food (Starbucks), as well ass several other retail settings and it set her on a path such that she is now 34 YO and makes better than $50K. Did she have to hustle? Did she have to make sacrifices? Did she get hooked on Ramen Noodles? Damn straight she did.
And I'm proud of her for it.

Starbuck's is a much better place to work than McDonald's. And good on your daughter! My son and daughter worked at restaurants for many years. They also worked very hard for very low pay. The biggest challenge was not having health insurance. If they had become seriously ill or were seriously injured, they would have owed hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills and likely would have to declare medical bankruptcy. I don't think that's any way to run the proverbial railroad.

 

[TrainMan]

Related to this post as far as shipping... Anyone in your area notice a pick up in freight on trains? I have. A set of tracks next to a work site. Very long, loaded up train cars, 60 to 80 cars long, 3 locomotives. Every 45 minutes throughout the day. I never saw that much train activity here before. Seems the Pan-Am Rail Service is trying to pick up where trucking is lacking.

Also I have a product on back order to ship June 13th, I really have my hope that it is. Reading this post kind off makes me feel a bit bummed. We will see I guess, if Quadratec will come through. I received everything else as promised on time from them.

The railroads are becoming greedy. They have fired crews and started combining 2 trains into huge monster trains. Less crews to pay. Around here in Pennsylvania (CSX & NS) we get trains of 200+ cars long with 2 head locomotives, a locomotive in the middle, and a pusher locomotive. Still only 2 guys responsible for a train they cant see the back of. Used to be 120 cars was a long train. "Precision Railroading" they call it...?

 

[BAT]

Thank you for the respectful replies. I have no problem with people disagreeing with me. And I believe what you are saying. However, I think your points are specific and isolated.

While we want things to go back to when we could order inexpensive Jeep parts and get them quickly, I think things will get better, but maybe not the same.

Sure, US unemployment numbers were low pre-pandemic. What those numbers didn't show was our significant underemployment problem. Envy of the world? Hardly. Envy of the Third World perhaps. You won't find many people in Western Europe, Japan, Canada, Australia or New Zealand envying the US labor situation. While their unemployment numbers might be higher, they have better pay, free health care, free college tuition, lots of vacation and retirement plans. (I'm not saying these systems would work in the US. I'm saying they have very good benefits and they like them.)

The Pandemic has broken open what was really going on. Many, many Americans were working very hard and just barely getting by or not even getting by without social programs. When most Walmart jobs are part time, minimum wage with no benefits, it is we the tax paying Jeep people who subsidize their incomes with Medicaid, SNAP, WIC, free school lunches and housing vouchers, for example. How nice for Walmart.

McDonald's jobs at $17 an hour might sound nice, but are those jobs part time with no benefits? These days, everyone knows working at McDonald's can be downright miserable with no opportunity for raises, promotions or even full time positions. So, should people take those jobs anyway?

I find it interesting that many people I talk to say we should not raise the minimum wage, we should not require employers to provide benefits and people should be happy they can get a job at all. These same people long for the "Golden Age" of the 1950s. Ironically, that Golden Age was largely due to labor unions providing good pay, good benefits and pension plans. (Yeah, unions got greedy and power hungry, but they also did a lot to improve working conditions, wages and benefits for workers.)

Thank you for sharing your perspectives. I do think this relates to Jeeping. If vendors are unable to provide new products, prompt shipping and good service, that's going to really dampen Jeep fun.

Interestingly enough often those same companies who likely offer all those good things to their employees don't offer the same to their US Counterparts. Some countries force companies to offer such stuff and they find they get better employees because of it but for some reason they don't see the same on this side of the pond. We had a retirement plan and it got scrapped sadly. the employees begged them not to get rid of it but fell on deaf ears. We don't get nearly the time off our counterparts get off overseas. This is all the same company but its run very different from country to country. If they can get away with making you work 24/7 until you die they will. The old company politics that you have to be in the office 12 hours a day minimum or your not a company team player still exist although the Pandemic shook that up somewhat.

 

[BAT]

This is a common misconception. Sure, some people just sit on their duffs and do nothing while their unemployment benefits come in. But when you actually look at what most unemployed people are doing, it's really not the case.

Unemployment benefits allow people to get out and look for a good paying job. It pays for child care while looking for a job. It allows them to buy new clothes for job interviews. It allows them to put gas into their cars to drive to interviews. It allows them to get haircuts for those interviews. It allows them to pay for food, rent and utilities while they look for work.

The issue is not that people don't want to work. The issue is people are tired of working for peanuts. Wages have not kept up with inflation. I often hear people say, "Raising the minimum wage will just cause prices to go up!". The reality is prices have already gone up and wages have not.

It's no coincidence that jobs which pay well are filled. Jobs which pay OK are mostly filled. Jobs that pay peanuts, and there are lots of them, go unfilled.

I recently saw a wanted ad which required a Master's degree for $15.00 an hour. Yeah, there's your problem. So, more accurately, as long as employers refuse to pay people a decent wage, we'll have this issue. Decades of corporate bean counters pouring over spreadsheets and saying, "We've got to get these labor costs down!" have caused this issue.

Spot on. Companies don't want to pay. Its all about the profits and the stocks rising in value the bottom end is looked at like ok work them till they die and then next up. In my line of work they are having a lot of difficulty finding workers who are skilled. Many of the older one's are retiring or have been worked to death and gone off to do something else and they just don't replace them they just shift that workload over to someone who is already overworked until they call it quits, Right now they are struggling to find qualified people and a lot of it has to do with they don't want to pay. Even if you don't pay fantastically sometimes people are looking for great benefits packages and willing to forgo some money in place but that is hard to come by as companies are cutting more and more benefits.

 

[MPMB]

I get the sentiment but I can remember pre internet days of shopping and going around town wasting a day of looking for a semi-niche item that could not be found or was "3-4 weeks" to get in or just settling for and paying too much for something that was "close enough" but not exactly what I wanted.

Everybody likes to be nostalgic until it is time to pay the extra for it.

Locally we had a Coast To Coast hardware store that had everything a Lowes/HD had, but a fraction of the footprint. One of those places that smells of fertilizer the moment you walk in. Fred Meyer (Kroger 1-stop shopping) moved into town and they closed within 6 months. The store owner said they weren't going to fight to stay alive. Sad, because they usually had what we needed for last-minute racecar supplies.

 

[Klutch]

I don't buy the constant "Amazon killed my business" excuse. No doubt Amazon is tough competition. But when I look closer, I typically find inept management as the primary cause.

A local mall is a good example. Like many malls, it's dying and management claims they can't compete with Amazon. Yet, just a few blocks away there's a newer brick & mortar shopping center that's booming all the time. Why? Well, because that shopping center has stores where people want to shop. The nearby mall killed most of their foot traffic when they ripped out the ice skating rink years ago because it wasn't bringing in enough cash. Hello, the ice rink was bringing in cash for whole mall because people who went there to skate also went to the food court and other stores. When parents dropped off their kids for hockey or figure skating practice, they would shop at the mall stores. The movie theaters were also 1980s relics which resembled watching a movie in a 1-car garage. Now that mall has a few head shops and little more. Time to convert it into condos.

Just up the freeway, at the southern end of Denver, is a huge mall that still packs them in. That place is ALWAYS packed. Why? Well, because it's a well-managed mall that attracts high quality stores which attracts shoppers, that's why. You don't hear them complaining about Amazon.

 

[redrider]

Some of us still want to see, hear, smell and taste before we buy.

 

[NH Hick]

Agree with you completely. I ordered stuff that is on back order and don't have an issue at all with that as the companies are honest and you at least know what to expect... somewhat anyway. I'm waiting for a steering stabilizer now that I know a lot of other people are in the same boat. It will come when Fox catches up.

But when I see this, I expect it to ship the day I order it. Not whenever they feel like it. Honesty and integrity goes a long way. Have no idea when or if this will even ship after believing it was in stock and would ship last Wednesday when I ordered it

 

[Blue Ridge]

I don't buy the constant "Amazon killed my business" excuse. No doubt Amazon is tough competition. But when I look closer, I typically find inept management as the primary cause.

That's a tough thing to make a blanket statement about. Two of my biggest hobbies are aquariums and firearms and I miss the heck out of stores! Both of those industries have been decimated by online retailers from a locally-owned store perspective. Bud's guns and LiveAquaria can sell at 5% margins and no store is going to be able to pay rent on that. And while there are people (like me) who would never buy anything alive sight unseen and will gladly pay more for a gun they can lay eyes and hands on, there aren't enough of us out there to keep these shops open.

And before anybody says that the same "x" firearm is identical to the others, take as an example my Browning A5. I bet I looked at 2 dozen of them for 18 months before I found the one for me. I wanted nice wood grain and didn't feel chances were high that ordering a random one would be this nice. Could I have saved $75-100 and gotten one way sooner by ordering from Buds? Sure. But I got the one I wanted and I'll hand it down one day. And don't even get me started on fish & aquatic plants and such.

All this to say that in case of Jeep accessories, certainly one is more or less identical to the next. But shops where I used to peruse firearms and live fish are all gone in my area, and it isn't just an issue of poor management. I'm sure there are lots of other examples that don't affect me personally also.

 

[Klutch]

That's a tough thing to make a blanket statement about. Two of my biggest hobbies are aquariums and firearms and I miss the heck out of stores! Both of those industries have been decimated by online retailers from a locally-owned store perspective. Bud's guns and LiveAquaria can sell at 5% margins and no store is going to be able to pay rent on that. And while there are people (like me) who would never buy anything alive sight unseen and will gladly pay more for a gun they can lay eyes and hands on, there aren't enough of us out there to keep these shops open.

And before anybody says that the same "x" firearm is identical to the others, take as an example my Browning A5. I bet I looked at 2 dozen of them for 18 months before I found the one for me. I wanted nice wood grain and didn't feel chances were high that ordering a random one would be this nice. Could I have saved $75-100 and gotten one way sooner by ordering from Buds? Sure. But I got the one I wanted and I'll hand it down one day. And don't even get me started on fish & aquatic plants and such.

All this to say that in case of Jeep accessories, certainly one is more or less identical to the next. But shops where I used to peruse firearms and live fish are all gone in my area, and it isn't just an issue of poor management. I'm sure there are lots of other examples that don't affect me personally also.

You make some good points. I didn't intend to include any and all businesses. Here in Colorado Springs, we still have many brick and mortar gun stores that are booming.

 

[Blue Ridge]

Chuckled at “booming” to describe a gun store but I’m awfully glad to hear that. In my neck of the woods more are closing down. Weird that firearm sales are skyrocketing but gun shops seem to struggle, but online sales suit a lot of people. I imagine for people just getting in to shooting or buying a first gun for home protection, a gun shop can seem intimidating. I’ve always enjoyed talking shop to fellow enthusiasts and shopkeepers alike. Same with my local 4wd shop.

 

[Hootbro]

I don't buy the constant "Amazon killed my business" excuse. No doubt Amazon is tough competition. But when I look closer, I typically find inept management as the primary cause.

A local mall is a good example. Like many malls, it's dying and management claims they can't compete with Amazon. Yet, just a few blocks away there's a newer brick & mortar shopping center that's booming all the time. Why? Well, because that shopping center has stores where people want to shop. The nearby mall killed most of their foot traffic when they ripped out the ice skating rink years ago because it wasn't bringing in enough cash. Hello, the ice rink was bringing in cash for whole mall because people who went there to skate also went to the food court and other stores. When parents dropped off their kids for hockey or figure skating practice, they would shop at the mall stores. The movie theaters were also 1980s relics which resembled watching a movie in a 1-car garage. Now that mall has a few head shops and little more. Time to convert it into condos.

Just up the freeway, at the southern end of Denver, is a huge mall that still packs them in. That place is ALWAYS packed. Why? Well, because it's a well-managed mall that attracts high quality stores which attracts shoppers, that's why. You don't hear them complaining about Amazon.

Mall management ineptness only goes so far. It was inevitable that Malls would contract to the point that the only successful ones would be high end retail oriented. With the contraction of many anchor store retail brands like Sears and JC Penny and coupled with the fact that malls are no longer social gathering places for teen's and 20 something's, the writing was on the walls for many years before we got to here in the present situation.

Retail landscape has never stayed static

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