WH Considering Reclassifying Fast Food Jobs As 'Manufacturing'

NY Times ^ | 2/20/2004 | David Cay Johnston

[freeeee]

From a tax basis, food preparation is considered manufacturing.

Well, there you have it people. The IRS tax code is the authoritative guide to common sense. How lucky we are to have them!

[RobRoy]

>>Is cooking a hamburger patty and inserting the meat, lettuce and ketchup inside a bun a manufacturing job, like assembling automobiles?
Um, no.<<

You are so right. You can do the latter stoned. If you attempt to do the former in such a condition, you'll be fired!

[Porterville]

When business is good...employees share the wealth (comparatively), and when business is bad...employees share the loss. Just that simple.

LOL, you are a riot.

Fight taxes not BUSINESS. Socialism kills business and leads to these WalMart fuedal/sharecropping systems becase they tax them out of the country. Destroy socialism completley and you wouldn't have to worry about your jobs leaving. DESTROY TAXES, there is your answer in two words. No deep philosophical pondering, economic analysis about interest rates, debt or assets.... Communism fails every time, and if the government keeps getting involved in every aspect of American life, there will be another 1860

[Solson]

Assembling hamburgers is still assembly...mass assembly in the case of a fast food chain. So, it is manufacturing.

Common sense is maintaining consistent definitions. Why you would somehow intimate this isn't "common sense" is really without merit.

The change is a technical decision. Thus, maintaining consistency between government agencies and their classifications is common sense...even if it is the IRS

[freeeee]

Let's cut the BS.

Jobs are going out of this country at an accelerating rate, spurred on by policies enacted by our government.

In an effort at damage control, minumum wage burger flipping jobs are reclassified as manufacturing, so when this becomes an issue in the next election, statistics can be cited that show things aren't so bad.

All of this is painfully obvious to everyone with an IQ above room temperature. Claiming this reclassification is done for any other reason but political damage control is an insult to the voters intelligence and reaffirms cynicism and distrust in government.

[Paul Atreides]

I'd classify some of them as Waste Management.

[MegaSilver]

But every single American believes his or her can and should be. And *that* is why there will always be a need for an economic underclass. The Dem's know this and choose to exploit them via the unions or as political pawns in the case of illegal immigrants.

Now, labor unions can be good things. What needs to happen, though, is a restoration of the balance of power between unions and corporations, as Barry Goldwater suggested in The Conscience of a Conservative. Unfortunately, his ideas were never properly implemented; as a result, labor unions have become increasingly corrupt and manufacturing jobs increasingly prone to offshoring.

[Petronski]

What the hell are they smoking over there? First that BS about outsourcing being good for the economy (incomplete to the point of being inaccurate) and now this! Someone's got to take a walk over this one. Sheeesh!

[Oatka]

Let's cut the BS.
Jobs are going out of this country at an accelerating rate, spurred on by policies enacted by our government.
In an effort at damage control, minumum wage burger flipping jobs are reclassified as manufacturing, so when this becomes an issue in the next election, statistics can be cited that show things aren't so bad.
All of this is painfully obvious to everyone with an IQ above room temperature. Claiming this reclassification is done for any other reason but political damage control is an insult to the voters intelligence and reaffirms cynicism and distrust in government.

BINGO on every count! Thank you.

[Eva]

I suppose you prefer federal gov't control of wages and prices, soviet style. It didn't work for them and it wouldn't work here. Give it up and get a life. If all you can do is flip burgers, or work at Walmart, then go for it.

On the other hand, if life is pretty good for you, maybe you should MYOB, and stop trying to fix what ain't broke.

[Swanks]

Mankiw is going to cause Bush to lose in Nov

Mankiw. In terms of an asset.....The Republican's Terry McAuliffe

[Ciexyz]

Impressions are everything. I know Democrats who still talk about the 'ketchup is a vegetable' gaffe by the Pubbies as proof that Republicans are unfeeling and unconcerned.

[DannyTN]

Now that fast food has been determined to be manufacturing, can we outsource it?

[Hank Rearden]

There must be some solution. Namely, because everyone can't be: a technical worker, professional worker, or government employee.

Virtually everyone I know has far too much self-respect to ever desire to be, much less actually be, a government employee.

The few I know who are, are almost to a man, complete dolts.

[SamAdams76]

[jwalsh07]

Yeah and plugging in the buffer is an electrical engineering job.