Delusional Job Flyer Blames ‘Lazy Workers’ For 50% Price Increase, Inspires This TikToker To Share 19 Ridiculous Job Signs
Interview
Everyone wants to find a job with attractive benefits. Medical insurance can be frighteningly expensive, if your job does not provide it, and it’s great to know that you can still get paid during your annual January ski trip. However, when it comes to businesses that do not offer benefits and have less than ideal working conditions, they can have a hard time finding workers. Especially in 2022, when unions are on the rise and employees are feeling empowered to speak out about the downsides of their jobs, companies need to adapt to the increased standards of today, or they will be called out.
One restaurant in New Jersey recently came under fire after they posted a sign explaining their increased prices and advertising job openings. The sign was shared by the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United on TikTok, where the video has received 1.4 million views in the last month and sparked many conversations about the working conditions in the restaurant industry. Below, you can read the sign yourself, as well as some responses from viewers and an interview with a representative from ROC United, and see some of the other flyers business owners have angrily shared. Then if you’re interested in reading another Bored Panda article featuring employees speaking out about their treatment, check out this piece next. Image credits: roc_unitedA diner in New Jersey recently came under fire after a passive aggressive sign they posted went viral on TikTok
The video was shared by Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, a non-profit dedicated to improving working conditions in the restaurant industry
Viewers have responded by calling out the business owners for their delusional sign
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The Restaurant Opportunities Centers United is a non-profit organization in the United States that works to “improve restaurant workers’ lives by building worker power and uniting workers of various backgrounds around shared goals and values”. Their website explains their vision as a “society that treats restaurant workers with dignity and respect and an industry that prioritizes racial and gender equity and strives to increase the standard of living for all working-class people”. The restaurant industry is notorious for enabling toxic behavior in the workplace and sweeping abusive work environments under the rug, so ROC United works to “overcome the obstacles racism and sexism place in their way by helping them understand their rights and advocating for political representation through organizing, educating, training, and agitating”.
We reached out to ROC United on TikTok to hear how common they think it is for restaurant owners to have mindsets like the owners of the diner in New Jersey. "It’s unfortunately very common for restaurant management and owners to scapegoat workers for their inability to find people who want to work for them," they told Bored Panda. "Restaurant workers are tired of making poverty wages and they’re tired of the mistreatment, and they’re taking the power back. They’re standing up for themselves and holding employers to a higher standard."
We also asked ROC United if they could explain a bit how their non-profit helps bring an end to toxic work environments in the restaurant industry. "To date, ROC United is proud to have activated more than 500,000 low-wage restaurant workers, nearly 1,000 employer partners, and tens of thousands of consumer allies across 11 staffed chapter offices," they told us.
"Over the last 20 years, ROC has celebrated many victories, including: helped pass minimum wage increases and eliminate subminimum wages in more than 10 states and 20 cities, played an instrumental role in winning policy advances on paid sick days, wage theft, and eliminating the tipped minimum wage in more than 15 states and several cities nationwide, distributed more than $1 million to over 5,000 restaurant workers who lost their jobs because of the COVID-19 pandemic, won dozens of workplace justice campaigns against national food chains, including more than $230,000 settlement in unpaid back wages with the Bartmann Group in Minneapolis, secured a victory in ensuring tips belong to the employees who earned them, partnered with about 1,500 responsible employers to promote the “high road” to profitability, trained more than 10,000 low-wage workers to advance to higher-paying restaurant jobs through our CHOW Institute workforce development & training program."
So the government handouts pay better than your hourly rate? Maybe if you offer a better rate you might get people to start at least.
Lastly, we asked ROC United what they would recommend restaurant workers do when they encounter situations that make them uncomfortable at work. "If something makes you feel uncomfortable at work, it usually means something isn’t right. Trust your gut. Restaurant industry culture has a tendency to make you believe that you need to shoulder these issues on your own. Jot down everything you’re experiencing, including time and date stamps, and start researching your workplace rights. If you need assistance and want to learn more about your workplace rights and what you can do if your rights are violated, reach out to us!"
ROC United is making waves throughout the food service industry in the US by creating several innovative programs, including CHOW, or Colors Hospitality Opportunities for Workers. CHOW offers free, professional training of front and back-of-house skills to employees in seven US cities: New York City, Philadelphia, Washington, DC, Michigan, Oakland, and Los Angeles. The program focuses on providing opportunities to people of color, undocumented workers and women, so they have the skills they need to enter the restaurant industry set up for success. Participants are also educated on how to identify and address segregation and sexual harassment in the workplace, so they can protect themselves and others from abusive environments.
Welcomes abuse, loves to be beaten, likes being called names...
A yes the one who has internalized their abuse to the point that their symptoms are now job qualifications. Got it.
"Has an open schedule" so we can schedule you for 4 or 5 hours in the middle of the day or at all different times of day each week so that you can't possibly have a 2nd job or a life. "Doesn't cry" and "Smiles no matter what" means we're gonna treat you like Sh*t and you'll smile and say "thank you, may I have another."
I might just have to pass on this oh so appealing job posting. Just sayin.
I can tell this is bullsh!t and am no longer smiling, so I guess that rules me out.
So… a robot. If one were to build a robot that could meet all of these requirements, would they still get paid?
I like this ad. It is what I would look for in an employee, and they are upfront about it.
I used to work at a McDonald's and my meals were never discounted. Instead, I always got them free if I immediately started my shift after I was done eating.
Yeah, I bet most people are still living large on that $3600 and probably won't need to work for the rest of their lives! /s
The sign in the original TikTok shared by a diner in New Jersey seems laughable at first glance, but it is only the tip of the iceberg of toxicity. It’s no wonder that their employees quit when management has a mindset like that. Thankfully, organizations like ROC United are working hard to change restaurant culture, and hopefully, working conditions will continue to improve for service industry workers everywhere. Let us know in the comments what you think about the sign in the video or if you have ever worked in a toxic restaurant.
The pandemic can't be blamed for everything, I expect you're short staffed because people are finally becoming empowered enough to stand up and say they are paid an absolutely disgusting excuse of a wage and their time and efforts are much better spent elsewhere
Why don’t they just say 7 am - 2pm…..because it would make them look like the unreasonable abusive jerkwads they are?
A sign like any of these in a restaurant is the quickest way to ensure that I will spend my money somewhere else.
True! And before going somwhere else, I would prob give the owner a piece of my mind.
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It's more than a living wage, although that is important. It's about the quality of the work environment. People just don't want to put up with horrible management anymore. People look at a job that does pay a living wage but comes with a boss that abuses them and walk away from it when they would have put up with it five years ago. If you treat people right, respect them as human beings, give them a positive and safe environment, and pay them a living wage, you can actually pay them less than the asshat nextdoor that abuses their employees and refuses to provide a safe environment for their workers, and they'll come work for you.
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‘We’ve fleeced our staff for years, we now have a problem because we’ve spent the money on fancy cars and condos, we are ill prepared for changes in the labour market and have zero management skills, we need the staff and customers to step up and cover for us, we can’t admit that we lack business skills so we will blame the government for our systematic failures, in the mean time we will put up posters to shame you (our customers) into paying our staff, we will also blame the lowest paid members of staff for our business struggling.’ The American Dream?
Pandemic : starts in Asia. Putin : starts war in Europe. Republicans : (thanks Biden!)
Gift card raffle and snacks are not “benefits”! They think people are stupid!
As a German I would even take offense at the word benefits for things that are basic rights in Germany.
Load More Replies... 1) Biden is not to blame for the economy. Putin is. His war with Ukraine is causing gas prices to skyrocket, which in turn causes all prices to skyrocket. 2) There is no labor shortage. There is a shortage of people willing to be abused at work any longer.
I actually like these signs because they point out the douchebags that should lose their restaurants because of how out of touch with reality they are. I saw video of a guy that snapped a business owner back to reality when the business owner whined that he could never keep employees, had high turn around and called the employees lazy. The guy turned to him and said "The reality is, if you have high turn around and can't keep employees...you're the problem...not them. It tells me you don't respect your employees and don't pay them enough. It also tells me that you expect the employees to work as hard as you do. But they don't own the business..you do. No one is going to work as hard or harder than you. You need to get used to that fact right now." Then he told him how to change his attitude and approach being an employer differently.
Was it John Taffer from'Bar Rescue'? Sounds like something he would yell at an owner lol
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The American business system is so addicted to it's wage slave work force they actually do not know what to do when the work force starts to say "pay me a living wage".
It's so lazy and self righteous to blame the government rather than admit you're a shitty employer.
It's confirmation bias. These are toxic managers who already have no respect for their workers, believing that they're all lazy and stupid. So they put up a help wanted ad with a hostile tone that makes it sound like an awful place to work. As a result they get no good applicants, and thus their beliefs are confirmed.
I find it hard, really hard, to not downvote every single picture in this post. I mean, from which freaky planet are those business owners anyway haha.
Why are companies complaining that no-one wants to work? That why you have to pay them you dumb f***s! I like my job but if didn't need the money I would t be doing it
I got tired of seeing roc_united's face in every other sign. It was also obvious that most/all were minimum wage jobs or worse (based on tips). I'm also not surprised that some of them are MAGA
A sign like any of these in a restaurant is the quickest way to ensure that I will spend my money somewhere else.
True! And before going somwhere else, I would prob give the owner a piece of my mind.
Load More Replies... It's more than a living wage, although that is important. It's about the quality of the work environment. People just don't want to put up with horrible management anymore. People look at a job that does pay a living wage but comes with a boss that abuses them and walk away from it when they would have put up with it five years ago. If you treat people right, respect them as human beings, give them a positive and safe environment, and pay them a living wage, you can actually pay them less than the asshat nextdoor that abuses their employees and refuses to provide a safe environment for their workers, and they'll come work for you.
Load More Replies... ‘We’ve fleeced our staff for years, we now have a problem because we’ve spent the money on fancy cars and condos, we are ill prepared for changes in the labour market and have zero management skills, we need the staff and customers to step up and cover for us, we can’t admit that we lack business skills so we will blame the government for our systematic failures, in the mean time we will put up posters to shame you (our customers) into paying our staff, we will also blame the lowest paid members of staff for our business struggling.’ The American Dream?
Pandemic : starts in Asia. Putin : starts war in Europe. Republicans : (thanks Biden!)
Gift card raffle and snacks are not “benefits”! They think people are stupid!
As a German I would even take offense at the word benefits for things that are basic rights in Germany.
Load More Replies... 1) Biden is not to blame for the economy. Putin is. His war with Ukraine is causing gas prices to skyrocket, which in turn causes all prices to skyrocket. 2) There is no labor shortage. There is a shortage of people willing to be abused at work any longer.
I actually like these signs because they point out the douchebags that should lose their restaurants because of how out of touch with reality they are. I saw video of a guy that snapped a business owner back to reality when the business owner whined that he could never keep employees, had high turn around and called the employees lazy. The guy turned to him and said "The reality is, if you have high turn around and can't keep employees...you're the problem...not them. It tells me you don't respect your employees and don't pay them enough. It also tells me that you expect the employees to work as hard as you do. But they don't own the business..you do. No one is going to work as hard or harder than you. You need to get used to that fact right now." Then he told him how to change his attitude and approach being an employer differently.
Was it John Taffer from'Bar Rescue'? Sounds like something he would yell at an owner lol
Load More Replies... The American business system is so addicted to it's wage slave work force they actually do not know what to do when the work force starts to say "pay me a living wage".
It's so lazy and self righteous to blame the government rather than admit you're a shitty employer.
It's confirmation bias. These are toxic managers who already have no respect for their workers, believing that they're all lazy and stupid. So they put up a help wanted ad with a hostile tone that makes it sound like an awful place to work. As a result they get no good applicants, and thus their beliefs are confirmed.
I find it hard, really hard, to not downvote every single picture in this post. I mean, from which freaky planet are those business owners anyway haha.
Why are companies complaining that no-one wants to work? That why you have to pay them you dumb f***s! I like my job but if didn't need the money I would t be doing it
I got tired of seeing roc_united's face in every other sign. It was also obvious that most/all were minimum wage jobs or worse (based on tips). I'm also not surprised that some of them are MAGA
