Pie for Table #12?

After reading Nickel and Dimed, I could not stop thinking about how people slave away to a week’s pay that may amount to a shopping trip for Paris Hilton. I began to think about if I have ever seen that happen or been like that? Have I ever just blatantly taken advantage of money in this manner? I am embarrassed to say, “Guilty as charged.”

Gee’N’Jays – I was 14 and it was my summer job. A small Mom/Pop ice cream fast food place. Frying chicken fingers and making banana splits was how I spent those summer months. I didn’t particularly like my job; my tasks weren’t challenging, my manager was disorganized, and my friends were usually at the pool while I was asking a 7-year-old, “Want one scoop or two?”

One other major reason was this I was doing this job to earn a spending money for the summer. To be honest, my disinterest in my job (and subconsciously knowing I didn’t desperately need the money) led me to not care about my performance. There were other girls who had been there for years, who loved it (or seemed to) and this was their life. I would show up late, and they would be thirty minutes early. I would be watching the clock and they would be watching the door. Needless to say my work ethic was severely lacking; but it stemmed from a lack of need. There was not animosity between us, but it was an understood difference of work ethic from different forces pushing us there. They were the oldest of the families, and they were expected to pay for everything on their own, whereas I was more fortunate and had a majority of my expenses paid for by my parents. This was one of the first times I realized how people value money differently. More so, how people who are more fortunate take their benefits for granted; I was guilty of this.

At the time I felt like I didn’t need to work as hard as those girls. Why? Because I did not value the work I was doing, because the money meant something else to me. It did not mean I wasn’t going to have gas in my car or clothes on my back. When I got a measly paycheck I was not expecting it just meant my social life was shattered by not going to the movies that Friday night…inretrospect, not that earth shattering.

But when people are living only because of the job they have, it would seem like they would perform better. However, after reading Nickel and Dimed I found that was not the case. In one of the waitressing jobs Ehrenreich had, she did a little extra work making the desserts look presentable, and quickly was scolded by a co-worker “Don’t do that!! Now he (the manager) is going to make us ALL do that!” Clearly, this woman wanted her minimum wage with minimal work. But is that such a crime?

Maybe there were other circumstances, maybe this woman had another source of income, so she didn’t have to worry about the money as much? But still, she realized that the least amount of work still gets her the same pay check of someone who does more. It may have gotten Ehrenreich a pat on the back from the boss…but that’s about it.

I think this chronic laziness occurs because people realize their potential at these minimum wage jobs. They are not really going anywhere fast. So their self-image is completely destroyed. These people are getting paid dirt for dealing with people who treat them like dirt. They come to realize after a while, that if table #12 doesn’t get his apple pie exactly 5 minutes after he orders it, the world is not going to end. So then what’s a few more minutes? Take a smoke break. Joke around with the cooks. Complain with the other waitresses. And so on. Praise from a job can only do so much. In big coroporate jobs, praise from a boss can be interpreted into something else, maybe a wage increase or a promotion. But praise from a manager of a diner, doesn’t get you any closer to anything. And that is why people who work in minimum wage jobs don’t care to get the praise, which leads them into a severe downward spiral of half-ass work.

By the way, table #12 is still waiting for his pie…