‘Guys. She Quit After One Shift’: Person From An Office Job Tries Working In A Food Service Job, Gets A Reality Check
What do you think of when you think of working for minimum wage? Flipping burgers? Sweeping floors? Putting money in a cash register? Maybe if you haven’t had one of those jobs before. Otherwise, you’re probably thinking of carrying bags of garbage that weigh half as much as you do, sweating profusely, sticking your hands in disgusting substances, and being treated like dirt by the general public.
A Tumblr page that invites followers to submit stories airing their frustrations with working in service jobs posted this submission in which a waiter witnessed what happened when someone who was used to having a cushy office job gave food service a try. She didn’t even last one shift after finding out what anybody who works in food service could have told her, that “low-skill” jobs are not low-effort.
Image credits: gurmit singh (Not the actual photo)
Someone submitted this story to a blog where service workers vent
Obviously, every work environment has its disadvantages, but another person who went from working in retail to a desk job agreed that it feels downright luxurious compared to being on your feet all day and being nagged not to lean on the counter or drink water in front of customers.
People with desk jobs might take their freedom for granted: a study in the UK in 2016 found that on average, office workers spent barely three hours of their eight-hour workday focusing on work. That’s not necessarily a condemnation of them—psychologists suspect that there’s simply an upper limit to the time people can focus on cognitive work like writing, and in a culture of 40-hour work weeks for all, that time just isn’t used efficiently.
This user shared their experience going from retail to a desk job
You might have been told before that everybody should work in food service at least once in their life. Reading this thread, it’s hard not to agree. If you eventually end up in a job that’s less physically demanding, knowing what the service world is like can give you empathy, unlike people who verbally abuse service workers and argue against minimum wage increases from a position of not even knowing what their jobs are like.
Commenters agreed that service jobs are not for the faint of heart
There seems to be an inverse relationship to how much someone is paid and how hard they work. Well I guess that's what happens when you shift to a service based economy from an industrial one.
Yes it's insane. A guy cleans our apt. First they worked with 2 guys. The apt owners skipped one to get more money themselves for doing nothing. I said to him: it's antisocial that you get so little for it. I earn more for sitting on my ass drawing maps. Yesterday I heard about guys pretending to be crazy so they don't have to work. Can't really blame em. Easy talking from behind a cosy desk that unemployed should go clean or pluck apples.
The prez getting briefed watching his favorite tv shows and communicating with his fellow citizens via Twitter comes to mind. Saad
It's not that. In free-market economies, payment is usually inversely proportional to the availability of the goods or services due to the supply and demand mechanics. It was no different in industry - a line worker earned much less than the engineer who designed said line or the owner of the plant. Or even his own foreman. On the other hand, say, miners (especially in heavily mechanized mines, where you need to know how to operate complex machinery) tend to earn much more than your rank-and-file office workers, although they performing dangerous, physically taxing work. This is because it takes little skill to do general office work, while working in the modern mine requires significant strength and resilience on top of specialized, technical skills.
Most miners are children under the age of 12 who get paid pittance and die in collapses.
This is literally true. I've had 3 office jobs and every time I move to a new company I get paid double and have to do half the amount of work. That's why I'm on Bored Panda right now... Life is bliss!
I work in an office where this girl got hired from a completely different background job and now she takes absolute full advantage of stopping and chit chatting/gobbling up all the snacks in the break room because she never had that before at any other of her jobs. I get it's new to her and she likes the leniency but don't just abuse the system - you'll ruin it for the rest of us. For anyone reading this heading to a job where they are lenient about your tardiness or breaks, please keep the rest of your co-workers in mind and not blow it for everyone else.
Cut your comment out and stick it to her monitor (=
This is precisely the same problem that affects retail workers (as in a previous story). How ironic it is that that people that are often looked down upon and working for a pittance are often the hardest working people in society.
There seems to be an inverse relationship to how much someone is paid and how hard they work. Well I guess that's what happens when you shift to a service based economy from an industrial one.
Yes it's insane. A guy cleans our apt. First they worked with 2 guys. The apt owners skipped one to get more money themselves for doing nothing. I said to him: it's antisocial that you get so little for it. I earn more for sitting on my ass drawing maps. Yesterday I heard about guys pretending to be crazy so they don't have to work. Can't really blame em. Easy talking from behind a cosy desk that unemployed should go clean or pluck apples.
The prez getting briefed watching his favorite tv shows and communicating with his fellow citizens via Twitter comes to mind. Saad
It's not that. In free-market economies, payment is usually inversely proportional to the availability of the goods or services due to the supply and demand mechanics. It was no different in industry - a line worker earned much less than the engineer who designed said line or the owner of the plant. Or even his own foreman. On the other hand, say, miners (especially in heavily mechanized mines, where you need to know how to operate complex machinery) tend to earn much more than your rank-and-file office workers, although they performing dangerous, physically taxing work. This is because it takes little skill to do general office work, while working in the modern mine requires significant strength and resilience on top of specialized, technical skills.
Most miners are children under the age of 12 who get paid pittance and die in collapses.
This is literally true. I've had 3 office jobs and every time I move to a new company I get paid double and have to do half the amount of work. That's why I'm on Bored Panda right now... Life is bliss!
I work in an office where this girl got hired from a completely different background job and now she takes absolute full advantage of stopping and chit chatting/gobbling up all the snacks in the break room because she never had that before at any other of her jobs. I get it's new to her and she likes the leniency but don't just abuse the system - you'll ruin it for the rest of us. For anyone reading this heading to a job where they are lenient about your tardiness or breaks, please keep the rest of your co-workers in mind and not blow it for everyone else.
Cut your comment out and stick it to her monitor (=
This is precisely the same problem that affects retail workers (as in a previous story). How ironic it is that that people that are often looked down upon and working for a pittance are often the hardest working people in society.