Posted on 03/14/2015 6:54:42 AM PDT by afraidfortherepublic
Seattle is about to embark on a civic experiment that most experts predict will be an economic disaster; a $15 an hour minimum wage is set to go into effect on April 1st. And some restuarants in the city have already shuttered their doors and are either going out of business or moving to friendlier climes.
This was entirely predictable - and was predicted when the measure passed the Seattle city council. Restuarants are particularly sensitive to this sort of increase in wages since most of their employees are paid at the minimum, and such a large percentage of their operating costs go to labor.
“Washington Restaurant Association’s Anthony Anton puts it this way: “It’s not a political problem; it’s a math problem.”
“He estimates that a common budget breakdown among sustaining Seattle restaurants so far has been the following: 36 percent of funds are devoted to labor, 30 percent to food costs and 30 percent go to everything else (all other operational costs). The remaining 4 percent has been the profit margin, and as a result, in a $700,000 restaurant, he estimates that the average restauranteur in Seattle has been making $28,000 a year.
“With the minimum wage spike, however, he says that if restaurant owners made no changes, the labor cost in quick service restaurants would rise to 42 percent and in full service restaurants to 47 percent.”
Restaurant owners, expecting to operate on thinner margins, have tried to adapt in several ways including “higher menu prices, cheaper, lower-quality ingredients, reduced opening times, and cutting work hours and firing workers,” according to The Seattle Times and Seattle Eater magazine. As the Washington Policy Center points out, when these strategies are not enough, businesses close, “workers lose their jobs and the neighborhood loses a prized amenity.”
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Look on the bright side. At least you won’t have to be paying taxes.
The Minneapolis airport has a restaurant like this. All they have are food runners. Still managed to bring me the wrong order since the runner didn’t know the difference between Bolognese and Carbonara sauce
Yup. I’ve often wondered when Obama would get around to issuing an executive order forbidding businesses from laying off workers.
Also gee, I'd thought that all these good communists in Seattle would be standing in line to pay extra to support a business which paid their workers $15 per hour. Yes I call them communists! I was outside Starbucks in Pike Place Market, the wife wanted a Starbuck's Pike cup and there were a group playing good old commie work songs by the Starbuck's door. Thought it was ironic that commies would be playing commie music outside a capitalistic enterprise.
“IIRC, urban Amish are the worst nontippers of all.”
They sneak bottles in to bars so they can drink cheap, play pool, steal from the happy hour buffet, etc. And of course, who besides them would go to a bar full of them? A bar with, er, urban Amish patrons, is a bar that is out of business.
Then there is the whole shoplifting from supermarkets meme, and the periodic lootings and arson.
They are not capable of sustaining a community.
In my neck of the woods, if you work fast food..ie Burger King, Wendy’s etc. you get paid regular minimum wage because these places are not traditionally the kind of places where people tip.
If you work at a regular restaurant where people sit to eat, and a wait person takes orders, brings food/drinks etc (not the cafeteria type places), you only get paid $2.19/hr. That’s IT. If it’s Joe’s greasy spoon upchuck, Texas Road House or a place with a chef, the hourly start rate is the same. Naturally, your tips are commiserate with the kind of place you work at, as well as your expertise. Joe’s upchuck isn’t going to see the kind of tips that Texas Roadhouse sees.
I once worked waitressing at a resort type place which paid me full minimum wage AND tips. I worked nearly 40 hrs./week and I was able to make a living as in, I was able to pay all of my bills and purchase food and not have to depend on any sort of government assistance. That is until one evening when I began my shift and the lights went out. Electric company pulled the power plug. Day before pay day, none of us ever received our wages, but the owner showed up at my new job waving hundred dollar bills around by the hand full. I threw him out of my dining room, and his friends too.
I should have grabbed the money from his hand and put it in my pocket. He was actually propositioning me. But, he wasn’t hurting financially as my children and I went hungry and my credit was destroyed during the interval between jobs.
Some places do struggle, but the better places will pick up the difference as lousy places go broke. That’s competition and it’s healthy as it weeds out poorly managed places.
Restaurants tend to under pay hourly wages to wait persons while bus persons get paid min wage AND take home $20% of the wait person’s tips. Business have been depending on the public to pay the wages of their employees for far too long. As a wait person, YOU don’t even get a tax break for paying out that 20% as your cost of doing business!
You can’t depend on tips for a living in a lot of places, because they’re too variable. Gone are the days when a quarter was a sufficient tip for a cup of coffee and piece of pie. But people still want to tip like that even with the pitiful wages that wait person’s receive.
Then, there are the places where as a wait person you PAY to work there! Places like that do exist. I had a friend in Florida who was awaiting a placement in one such place. Yep, there’s a line!
As a unionised wait person, my wage was 10% higher than the standard min wage for wait persons. That’s IT. For that, I got to turn over 2 hours pay per month, and I got to pay for medical insurance. There went the 10% difference. Restaurant unions in the state I worked in weren’t very good.
Sunday afternoons were the absolute WORST day of the week to be on shift, no matter which state I worked in. Sorry folks, but the after church crowd is the most demanding, and chinchi (stingy) customers of all. They don’t order cheap, they run you around while their kids are throwing garbage everywhere, and IF you get even a portion of the standard tipping amount, you’re doing well. You can count on 1/4 or less of the standard amount. Once in a RARE while wait persons actually receive the full amount. Nobody wants to be scheduled for sunday afternoons :(
If you can’t afford to budget in the tip, don’t eat there. Go to a fast food place. Some place you CAN afford.
Seattle Soup Kitchens will take over ,LOL
Everybody knows that anybody who creates a job for another human being is rich and has piles of money that they are just too greedy to share with their employees.
For them to run out on their responsibility to provide jobs for their faithful and loving employees just because they are forced to pay them a few more pennies is a crime.
Yes, been there and have the t-shirt. lol
Musicians often forget the visual and entertainment aspects of performing. Its not enough to be good; you have to look good and make others feel good. In many respects, its a show, albeit one on a small scale.
Once the crowd is energized, the performers feed off the crowd. The its a virtuous cycle!
Good luck in your musical endeavors. Its a special privilege to enjoy.
P;ayed 6 nights a week house gigs for many years. Only bugged by the union stooges a few times. But those few times were pretty bad! Now, there aren’t any house gigs left. Band on Friday and Saturday, maybe, and DJs the rest of the week. There used to be several Country bars that had live music 365 days a year. No more!
dittos!! on what you said.
I have an idea.
You are obviously a very intelligent person who knows a LOT about this subject.
Why don’t you find a nice building, borrow some money from the bank and start your own restaurant?
It’s pretty easy. All you have to do is pay all the inspection and registration fees, buy all the equipment and furnishings, make some arrangements with suppliers and hire some deserving employees just like you once were.
Once you are in business you can pay your employees a living wage, enough to pay all their bills and put food on the table.
All you have to do is generate enough business to cover all your monthly bills, service your debt and cover payroll.
And if it doesn’t work out and you go belly-up and spend the rest of your life buried in debt it will only be because you were to selfish to pay your employees a wage they could live on.
I’m sorry for your experience but geesh, how many broad brushes can you paint with at one time?!
When I visited my grandmother in Winston-Salem decades ago, I remember when she took me out for dinner one night with some of her friends. The restaurant? As I recall, it was called "S & W". You walk in, pick up a tray, and go down the serving line, selecting your options. At the end, a cashier would tote up what was on your tray and that was what you paid. (No tip jar, as I recall.)
Fast-forward a few decades: a night out with friends in Mountain View, CA, was at a place called "Togo's": you ordered your custom submarine sandwich, then played 20 questions with the additions. At the end of the line, your sandwich went one way while your money went another. Drinks? The soda fountain is right behind you, sir. Plus, you bussed your own table.
There is a reason our institutions have cafeteria lines: it's cheaper to operate. Schools for all ages, nursing homes, hospital cafeterias, even company lunchrooms. Soon, that's what will be left. Sit-down restaurants will fade as the new mininum-wage mania spreads across this great land of ours.
I predict one thing: as restaurants turn to "the food line" there will be a growth in delivery services: not everyone likes to cook, and having the food come to you may be worth some money. Instead of just Chinese and pizza, soon you may be able to order a steak dinner to be delivered. Already, many of the better restaurants are doing a brisk "take-out" business. Some will go exclusively that way.
LaBron James is a notorious small, or no tip at all,kinda guy.
Good reason to eat at home. Then I don’t have to worry how much salt is in the food or if they actually have something I can eat.
Eating out with digestive disorders is a nightmare in it’s self.
Don’t worry you middle class unsophisticated PEONS, foot in mouth biden says you are classless any way; wonder if he thinks he’s so high brow, just because he can ape the correct order to pick up the right fork at a State dinner?
Perhaps the return of automats is in our future.
You would need someone preparing the food, someone for cleaning and that is about it.
With computer controlling things, you could even have fast food prepared as ordered. This would insure freshness as well as cut down on waste.
Many low skilled jobs have been lost because of “minimum wage”
Before minimum wage, anyone willing to work could find a job. It paid what the owner thought it was worth.
With minimum wage, when what the owner is willing to pay to have something done is less than what the government mandates he either does it himself or lets it go.
Minimum wage encourages investing in labor saving devices.
Central government control is slowing killing this once great nation all in the name of “compassion”.
Liberals live in a utopian fantasy world. They don’t want to understand the realities of running a business because they don’t want to acknowledge the risks and effort it takes. For liberals, the taking of money from someone (via taxation) is easier if they perceive that money as somehow being illegitimate, undeserved, or the results of exploitation.
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