Political Humor

Them believing that they are skilled labor tells you all about the value of their opinion.

My tech who knows how to take and read basic vital signs, flip granny like a pancake and wash her genitals without giving her an infection, walk her to the bathroom without yanking her IV out or cracking her head on the floor, the basic legal aspects of a psych admission, and the basics of psychosis, mania, etc well enough to briefly counsel a patient on their symptoms and which ones are important enough to notify me about-

-makes 16 an hour. Not that the warehouse worker doesn't deserve a living wage, but to call that skilled labor, and especially more skilled labor than food service is frankly delusional.

Even my partner who does work in food service knows more than the warehouse worker because he knows the biology and chemistry of food safety and sanitation, prevention of allergen cross contamination, knife / sharps safety, and fire and fire extinguisher classifications and how to put out a grease fire-

-and that was before he got a job in the hospital kitchen where he also learned about specialized medical diets including food and drink thicknesses and consistencies, sodium and carb restrictions, and even safety trays for violent and suicidal patients.

What's in that warehouse training? How to lift with your knees instead of your back and rotating stock? Storage temperatures? Because food service does all that too. The only thing they might know more about than a food service worker is how to use a forklift, and that's only if their employer thought they were intelligent and level headed enough to bother training on one, and this post does not evidence those qualities.

You need a permit to handle food.

Packing a box seems easier than operating the machines at mcdos. Timing the operation, consistency, time pressure, angry clients, ...

And like. We've all ordered from amazon. We know how they pack boxes. There's no skill involved there.

Honest labor is honest labor, whatever it's moping the floor or engineering new bridges and rockets. We need each other. And we all want to have a sufficient amount of these funny play-money papers once we clock out for today, or, rather, not feeling limited by the lack of them up to the point of starvation.

It's getting to the point that just renting an illegal basement "apartment" requires 2 incomes in some places... I make $30/hr and almost half my income goes to this shit garage apartment I live in... Forget "legitimate" apartments, those prices are just absolute insanity.

Without looking at "professional" college degree required jobs, the VAST majority of jobs out there pay barely over $20/hr where I am... Where are you going to live on that kind of garbage?

I cannot stand the focus on "family income." It completely ignores the experience of the individual and lumps multiple incomes together to try to claim that people are doing well... Yeah well fuck me for being undesirable and permanently single.

The phrase has lost all meaning. People just assume its a personal attack now cause I guess American egos are in decline or something.

Waxing moon or some shit.

Those bathrooms are proof those employees don't receive the hazard pay they should to clean those things. Mcdonalds.

Bro, I went to college and got a degree in packinology. Not everyone is qualified to use scotch tape and bubble wrap. You know how many people die every year choking on packing peanuts?

A brain sturgeon ain’t got shit on me.

All labour is skilled labour. If you have to be trained how to do something it’s a skill.

You think packing boxes is just putting things in boxes but I’m sure there is more to it, particularly when working for dystopian Amazon where they’re very strict with KPIs.

People called it unskilled labour as a means to pay people less.

If anything, I'd claim that burger flipping requires more skill than item boxing.

Stephen King taught me that cracking eggs is skilled labor for homeless alcoholic vampire-slaying priests

Which is why the very idea of "unskilled labour" is ableist.

I had to work with an occupational therapist for 2 weeks to learn how to wash my dishes at home without having injuries or breaking my dishes. I could not have walked into a job as a fry cook just because it's entry level and "unskilled". I'd need to learn some skills first.

There's no such thing as unskilled labour for me personally, because any labour requires skill when your body or mind is disabled.

Yeah, the "skilled labor" is when the script slipped.

No. "Skilled labour" means that you're hiring someone because of a skill or training they already have.

A carpenter is skilled labour because you expect a carpenter to already be able to work with wood. Your not going to train them from scratch on the job. They'll already have served as an apprentice or been trained in some other way.

A fork lift driver would need to have a license before you hired them. Skilled labour.

Somebody packing boxes or flipping burger is "unskilled labour". On day 1 you'll be taught the job. There will be no prerequisite skills needed. It doesn't mean "there's no skill in this job", just that "there is no requirement to have a skill to apply this job".

I sit at a desk at home, send emails, and make calls and get paid comparatively handsomely - these people have to stand over searing hot griddles, deep friers, and industrial equipment, risking serious injury at any moment for (close to) minimum wage. Doesn't seem right to me.

I took it as the total reverse.

That he "doing skilled labor" packing boxes at Amazon is above somebody "flipping burgers" at McDonald's.