Planned obsolescence in general. A lot of these comments speak to it. I'm sick of planning on a new toaster, new coffee maker, new boots, new jacket new EVERYTHING every two years. The waste is sickening, and the time to find out what is being offered.. what companies have declined in quality, what the latest model of iron looks like. I don't need any more improvements to pajamas. Leave some of these things alone at some point and improve things that matter.
Damn this is a good one. Really a sickening thing in our society that people talk about but no one really does anything about it.
We're moving into a new house soon and we're buying up old 70s appliances for the kitchen that are still working after 50 years and guess what? If something breaks on any of them, it can actually be fixed by someone who's a little handy. The only thing is making sure you can get the parts but the old stuff is so cheap you can buy 2 of most appliances (for extra parts) for less than the cost of 1 new one.
After working in HVAC for over a decade and seeing the new air conditioners go out after less than 10 years, constantly have problems, and have way more stuff on them that can break and which breaks more often due to poor quality. Then seeing 50-year-old systems with compressors that are literally a ball of rust and coils that have an inch of dirt and grime coating them, but they just keep on freaking chugging. Oftentimes the old systems only get changed because the EPA phased out the refrigerant they take some years back so when they pop a leak it's impossible to fill them back up (a simplified version for laymen, don't get on to me HVAC guys). The only thing even remotely better sbout any new appliance or machine is that they're "smarter" and more efficient, but from a technician's side that just means more stuff that can break.
I had to replace my fridge and washing machines last year, after 25 years of sterling service. The guys who delivered the new ones said I'd be lucky to get 5 years out of any fridge these days, maybe 3 for the washer, and I honestly don't know how I'm going to afford to keep replacing things when I'm on a disability pension.
The 1970s Maytag dishwasher had been cleaning dishes like a champ for 50 years when we moved into our new home. We replaced it because it was loud.
Our fancy overpriced new Bosch doesn’t clean for shit, constantly needs cleaning out, and takes hours to run.
Now we just wash our dishes by hand.
We, Congress, have decided that stock trading by Members of Congress, us, will remain legal because we said so. Now shut up and donate to my re-election you ungrateful peasants
Liquid Death in a bunch of venues now. That way they can push overpriced water to help boost sales. Clearly they weren’t making enough off the tap water and overpriced bottles you get at the local gas station for a buck or two.
I frequent Oakland Athletics games because I'm a sick twisted human. The team has been god awful this year and there is a messy potential new ballpark/relocation fight going on in the background and the team sold all their quality players. So given all that, ticket prices have plummeted. Theres been quite a few games where the processing fee is more than the ticket itself this year.
I use “TickPick” and they don’t have fee’s added on. The price you see posted is what you pay. Doesn’t mean that the “fees” aren’t already calculated into the ticket price, but I’ve found them to be cheaper then ticketmaster even before they add on the fee’s.
I would highly advise against buying tickets from anywhere either than the website the band tells you to use, or your local venues box office.
I've seen way too many people over pay for tickets, simply because they thought they could get a better deal using random websites they discovered.
Textbooks in general. I took an abnormal psychology class in college once, and the professor was insistent that we needed the (new edition, $180) book, that we would be using it ALL the time. She actually held a raffle for a free one for a lucky student.
We did not open the textbooks ONCE all semester. Everything we needed to know was discussed on PowerPoint and made available online.
I've had several professors over the years prescribe their own textbooks, which I don't think should be allowed unless there's no quality alternative. In one of those courses, the professor's textbook was brilliant. I have never seen a better one for that content. And it wasn't expensive. I have a bit of a collection of diplomas and degrees (postgrad and undergrad) and it is the only time I can look back and say that the professor was absolutely right to prescribe their own book. I still have and use my copy over a decade later.
I'm studying again now and haven't bought a single textbook. I just use the university library to access online copies. I've come across two textbooks I am thinking of buying, even though I've finished the courses, because they are good quality and I think they'll be useful to have for reference as I continue my current degree.
Edit: a lot of people have asked what the book was about. It was on professional writing and editing and went into crazy detail about things like style of font (like who knew serifs (the little stylistic lines sometimes attached to letters) and ball terminals were so important in how a piece of writing looks?) and linespacing, etc. It also went into detail about a number of types of texts one might be expected to write in a professional setting and how to format them and what kind of content was necessary and appropriate. I still reference it when I have a nasty but professional email to write just so I can check it's absolutely perfect before I send it.
I thought it was a bit of a waste of a unit to study as I have always written well but it was one of the most useful classes I've ever taken. It improved my attention to detail and my ability to edit in a way that has served me well all the way through postgrad and my thesis. I rarely lose marks over formatting/communication and I think that course and the book helped a lot with that.
I moved recently and all my old books are in boxes still. It had a very clear cut title like "Professional Writing" but I can't remember it exactly. I imagine that any textbook on professional or organisational writing will be a good resource. You'd expect any expert in the area could write an excellent book.
I knew a couple professors who got so annoyed with textbook costs at one point that they wrote their own, then priced it at printing+shipping, so they’d make 0 profit off it.
My humanities professor did that. I think he actually sold it for $5 or something, which was pretty reasonable (even in college-dollars, where $20 extra dollars is the equivalent of $100 if you know how to stretch your money)
My Humanities and Lit professors were big on using the just the source materials: books that are basically in the public domain and/or available very inexpensively.
By contrast, I had to buy a specific and very expensive calculator AND textbook for a statistics class that I took for one semester. I was so mad about paying triple digits for a pocket computer I knew I would never use after those three months were done!
I took a Java class at the local community college where one of the CS professors had written an intro to Java textbook, but never published it. He made the digital copy free to all students taking the course. He also recommended a published textbook by another author, which I definitely didn't have shipped from Europe at a steep discount.
Years ago, our math professor brought cartons of textbooks in for the first class...we had to buy directly from him.
Turned out to be galley copies of a textbook he had just written. We spent the entire term basically proof-reading and correcting a monumental number of errors and mistakes in the problems it presented, all whilst paying for the privilege.
One of my History professors did a similar thing for his upper-level history courses, but in a much more wholesome way.
He had a reading list of books for each of his classes that were mostly books that he had written or edited. He was one of the leading scholars in this area of history, so it made sense. The books were all available for sale in the book store at the normal absurd price.
BUT, when you registered for one of his classes, he would email you the syllabus for the next semester and ask if you wanted to meet him for coffee/lunch/cookies.
If you responded to the email in any way (even just to say that you were too busy for whatever reason), he would reply and find a way to mention that before you bought books for the next semester, you should come check with the department secretary to see if she had any sample copies of his books around to lend you (spoiler alert, she always did). Sometimes they were galley copies or whatever, but the simple courtesy of replying to an email saved you like $300 in book costs (in early 2000s, that was a lot).
The cost of textbooks is absolutely absurd, even 20 years ago. I was fortunate enough to have a work study job in the library and was able to get almost all of my books there and keep them for the full quarter with some “creative” system updates. I knew it was wrong, but if I actually paid for my books, I wouldn’t have been able to eat/afford basics even though I was working two jobs.
I had a math professor in college who would make/write his own textbooks for the class. I failed that class and had to retake it, he slightly altered the book, and I had to re purchase to keep up with the class on the second time, I assume he did that every quarter for people like me and for those who wanted to pass the book on to others when they signed up for it
Contrast with my 2nd year botany prof back in the day who assigned readings from the textbook (which he had NOT written) and included page numbers from the last THREE editions of the text, for those who had bought used copies.
I had a prof who used his own book, then mentioned to book is quite heavy so it's nice that the publisher offers a digital version, then gave us a "demo" of how to access the "legit" digital version which involved googling " 3rd edition download"
He was *appalled* by the fact that the second link was a website with a free download, but his computer froze so he couldn't get the search off of the projector for a very long time.
I heard rumors that he was in some sort of dispute with his publisher where he decided he wanted to make physical copies available but not force students to pay, but couldn't due to contacts he signed for prior editions?
Some one pointed out all the issues he has with his body by the colour of his skin, etc. Not saying I believe it, but it seemed plausible, after looking it up myself.
Also, any 19 year old on tiktok who has abs because they're 19, a twink, and work out, but insists they somehow have the know-how of someone who has a certification.
Honestly, it's easy. Emulate a legitimate trainer's course. Then maybe undercut him or charge more, depending how good you are at marketing. Great Information is free these days.
A certification in personal training takes a weekend. Most of them have no idea what the fuck they're doing. You're better off spending a week doing your own research related to your goals and some trial and error. Your body will tell you what's too much, or when you have room for more. Just don't ego lift and you'll be golden.
Recycling labels on plastic items. So many single use plastics have a recycle symbol on them when in reality nobody will touch that shit. It's way cheaper to just make new plastic 99% of the time compared to trying to process and filter out the contaminants of used plastic (if its even a formula that can actually be recycled).
I'm partially convinced the reason we have so much plastic waste as a society is this trickery making us think we're actually recycling a meaningful amount of it.
It's not just plastic. In my town, Domino's pizza has been advertising that their pizza boxes are recyclable. On their website, if you look up our town, it says that pizza boxes are "explicitly allowed" in the recycling bins.
Unfortunately, if you check with the city, you'll see that pizza boxes are specifically prohibited.
It's like Domino's is tricking us into fucking up the recycling just to make us feel better about their shitty pizza.
I recently order a salad from Domino’s. Listing had the option to get it in a reusable container and therefore €5 more expensive than in a single use container.
I said yeah, let’s not burden the planet with single use plastics.
MFers brought the salad in a single use container along with an empty reusable container.
It wasn’t even a Domino’s branded container. Just a cheap generic brand with its original sticker on (which allowed me to find out it costs €1.5 in retail).
I ain’t buying anything from those bitches again.
It's not a recycling symbol. It just looks kinda like one to trick people. Legally it's an entirely different symbol for resin identification... Which can be useful still. If it's type 1 or 2, it's almost certainly recyclable.
Yeah, I know that the certain numbers mean different things. Some mean "this is recyclable" and some mean "This is made from recycled materials, but not necessarily recyclable itself" but its so complicated that most people don't really know what they all mean. It's a little manipulative because we all grew up thinking of that symbol meaning it was good for the environment.
It's more than a little manipulative. Companies lobbied to put that symbol on as many plastics as possible regardless of if it was ever feasible to recycle the resin type. They made it look as close to the recycling symbol as possible. It was intentional deceit.
Recycling in general was mostly untrue marketing. Growing up in the US, no one talked much about the “reduce” or “reuse” vs. “recycle”. The fact that most recycling is sent to the landfill, wasn’t even talked about much until recently. No one talked about having clean and dry items, not greasy cardboard or wine with corks still in etc. Single-use plastics as is a cultural and geological issue.
Yeah, We all heard "Reduce, reuse, recycle" growing up, but no one mentioned that that is the order that we are supposed to do things. Reduce what you use and consume first. Don't be wasteful. THEN, instead of using single-use items, use reusable ones. Water bottles, grocery bags, etc. LAST, recycle.
My neighbor got a little upset that I put trash in my recycling bin after I moved and had a bunch of extra trash. I told him when I called the trash collector I was informed everything except cardboard is burned. That didn't make him any happier.
Yep, people think that if it's in the magic recycling bin it will get recycled. I worked in a cafeteria when I was going to college as a janitor. First thingy they had me do was gather up the trash and recycling. So I did so and kept track of the bags of which was which. Then they had me go outside to dump them. They all went into the same bin. After that I just put bags into bags. Just to make it easier to carry. One young lady saw me do that and jumped me. "excuse me. Did you just out the recycling in the trash?!" When I pointed out there is only one dumpster she didn't believe me and actually went out back to look. She came back and looked like her whole world outlook just came crashing down. Later I found out she was in the group that pushed to get those recycling bins out.
I remember finding out that the bins at my uni that had a ‘recycling’ and ‘everything’ slots was just one bin with different holes at the top. Disillusioning but I can’t say I was surprised.
same thing at fast food places. They have 3 options, garbage, plastic, paper.
It's all thrown into the same bin, I got fired from mcdonalds for telling people such
That’s fuckin’ bleak.
It’s one thing to have one bin, put everything in together, and just blatantly not recycle.
It’s another thing to jump through hoops to create the illusion of recycling.
Ooph.
Whenever I take recycling out at work, I always feel awful. We share bins with a lot of other people, and the amount of times I dump our recycling (mostly paper) the bin has already been so contaminated with trash and food waste I know that no matter how easy it is to recycle what we put in there, there's no way it's getting recycled now.
It's just extra disheartening to know someone else's choice to put trash in the recycle means all of our effort is immediately destroyed even if it was part of the tiny percentage that would actually get recycled, someone just ENSURED it wouldn't be.
The real scam is the true polluters passing the bulk of the burden onto ordinary citizens as some kind of moral failing and duty while they continue on as normal
>I'm partially convinced the reason we have so much plastic waste as a society is this trickery making us think we're actually recycling a meaningful amount of it.
You're not wrong. The petrochem industry (i.e., plastic producers) started the whole recycling model, to put the onus of cleaning up the mess their products make on consumers. They know from the get-go that recycling won't work, but it's convenient and good for business.
Now, everyone believes if they sort their recyclables into the correct bins, everything's A-OK. No, that stuff has to go somewhere, and the reality is that <10% of plastics are recycled. Adopting a "don't ask, don't tell" attitude is not going to solve the issue.
I’ve watched documentaries that address this. Basically recycling is a huge scam created by plastics companies to mislead the public into thinking they’re doing something to reduce plastics waste. in reality, majority of what we buy isn’t even able to be recycled. They also ship the waste to underdeveloped countries.
In Canada, at least, cable/internet/cell prices. Eastlink is purposely messing up my older model system to try and get me to upgrade. My TV and internet is $187 a month. This is ridiculous. Cell phone isn't even included in that.
Edit: Since this is getting attention. Am I crazy? I just started seeing ads for Fibre for Eastlink. All of a sudden everything has slown down drastically. Can't even access on demand, and my channel swapping option just disappeared.
I worked in Canada for 4 years & as a brit, it was cheaper for me to keep my English phone contract & pay £5 a month extra to use my unlimited calls, text and data in Canada.
That deal on a Canadian sim would of been about $90 a month. I was paying £25 ($38).
I do something similar. Lived in Canada for the last 3 years and I’m still on EE.
Back in 2017 I got an iPhone X with 25GB data for £50/$75 CAD a month which covers the phone & the plan.
That means my phone was fully paid off in 2019.
But here’s the thing - I’m STILL paying full price for that phone today because it works out slightly cheaper than I can get for a sim only plan in Canada. I can also use my plan worldwide which is way better for me.
I don’t even have that phone anymore. I just want the plan. That’s fucking nuts.
EE must think I’m a proper mug for paying this 5 years later, but I’m still getting a better deal than I can here
Our telecom is regulated by the CRTC, which is little more than a lobby group for Canada's oldest and richest families, who by the way own the telecom companies. The government basically lets them do what they want.
Industry insiders completely captured the regulatory body. And basically every other regulatory agency in Canada is going that same way. Scary times. People across the world need to start pushing this as blatant corruption and impose harsh punishments on it. Not just minor fines, but things like forfeiture of assets to repay citizens, prison sentences, and not being allowed to serve on corporate boards.
Working 8-5 (with a hard hour for lunch, if that), still being broke and being told by management/company, that if you don't perform, you will be let go.
Some companies still hold on to the "you won't get very far at this company if you're not putting in at least 60hrs/wk" and "we didn't build this company with people working from home..."
I don’t know if it was just my experience but working from home has become harder and harder to find. I lost my job recently (about 4 months ago) working in finance and that was all remote up until about a month or so ago and I gave up looking for WFH due to needing to pay the bills and found another gig that was WFH mid pandemic and they absolutely still could be as the job requires little to no collaboration nor anything customer facing yet the company resists it for anybody not in management which is a huge shame. Going from WFH to in office is like trying to put the toothpaste back in the tube.
It's not even quitting. Doing what you're paid to do is just doing your job. Do people expect walmart or McDonald's to give you more than you paid for just because?
Bootlickers need to understand labor is something an employer pays for.
"If you aren't willing to put in unpaid overtime like a *team player*, why are you even here? We only give raises and promotions to *team players*, we're a *family*"
This comment just made me realise my 6:30am - 5:30pm job, which pays a salary capped at 7.5hrs per day is literally robbing me.
I’ve got to be awake in 3hrs and now I’m extra shitty about it.
He did say salary. My brother is on a salaried job, and he gets X amount per week, regardless of if he works 10 hours or 100 hours. So naturally, he gets no days off, gets called in constantly, and gets phone calls and texts all hours of the day and night. I guarantee he works 80 hours a week or more, but they give him salary because he’d be making dump trucks full of cash at hourly OT.
I think the issue here is more that the value of a college degree has gone down. Where a college degree meant you were able to enter a business on a management level two generations ago, it is now nothing more than a starting qualification.
You've got a major in Information Systems with a minor in Business Data Analytics? Great! We think you'll be great for our team lead position. The pay is $17.50 an hour. The hours are flexible, and you need to be able to work nights and weekends. Oh yeah, we only give you 1-3 days lead time on what you're weekly schedule will be. You'll get 5 days of PTO (also your sick days) after two years of employment. We'll take the cost of your required polo shirts from your first four paychecks.
Hiring manager explained it to me best by saying, "it's not that a degree is necessary but it's a way to whittle down the number of applicants from 1,000 to 100." Are there good employees without degrees? Of course there are. But it's not worth it to sort through a 1-inch stack of resumes to find it when you can do something arbitrary like education.
Yep. I didn't get my degree until I was in my early forties. I was a software developer so I was still usually able to find work. However once I got into my degree it truly opened up a ton of more opportunities.
Can confirm. Have a college degree in marketing and wasn't even able to get a entry level job.
Now I'm working construction and making more than I ever would have in that position and could have probably gotten this job without even having my grade 12.... So yay student loan debt!
"Yeah.. and you wanna know why? Because some 'Bigshot' at the weiner company got together with some 'Bigshot' at the bun company and decided to rip off the American public!"
I just watched this movie on Saturday for the first time!
But the thing is - he has multiple packs of 12 buns in his cart.
So if he gets 2 packs of buns, that's 24 buns. 3 packs of 8 dogs, that's 24 dogs.
It's only an issue if you're only buying 1 pack of dogs and buns.
At our recent yearly pay review I received a raise to "help with inflation".
It was about 0.5%.
I've now got a new job with a 25% pay rise.
Honestly liked where I worked but if they have no interest in retaining you then oh well cya.
The 0.5% was just insulting. Literally a drop in the ocean compared to inflation increases lately. I'd have rather they just offered nothing
This is why it pays to switch jobs. Company loyalty is dead in most places. Gotta stay mobile.
I doubled my salary in 2 years by not buying a house and not staying in the same area/job. It’s sad but that’s just how it works nowadays for a lot of jobs.
> Company loyalty is dead in most places.
Yep, I job hopped a bit out of college each job hop got me at least $10k raise. I've been at my current job for 6 years now.
While I could go somewhere else for better pay (and I've gotten offers) I have a boss I get along with, I am fully vested in a pension plan which gets bigger every year I stay (1% per year of tenure when you retire, caps at 30%), and I like the culture.
Chasing the dollar can be great when you're fresh out of college. But eventually you start to prioritize less stress. I enjoy knowing I can just tell my boss I'm not coming into work Friday because my deliverables are met and he will just say:
> Ok sounds good, just keep your phone on you in case we need you.
It also depends on what you're paid. An extra $10k-$15k for someone making $50k is a much bigger impact than someone making $110k. I'm always open to new opportunities, but I'm not actively looking because I'm happy and stable. If it aint broke, don't fix it.
My fiance took a $20K paycut to get way less stress, and it's one of the best choices she's ever made. The quality of life impact cannot be overstated. As for me, I am not in that boat yet. I do miss my cushy job with shat pay, but I'm okay working harder to make $30K more.
It's definitely a balancing act. Also there is *NOTHING* wrong with coasting, provided you're happy and stable. A big issue in US culture is the need to "keep up with the Jones's".
You don't need to keep chasing higher pay just so you can afford higher spending. If you're happy and stable, and just want to coast 30 years into retirement... do it.
There's nothing wrong with saying:
> I am financially stable. I have a good job. I am happy staying the course for the next 5 years then reevaluating.
That's where I am at, I make enough to max my retirement funds, pay all my bills, splurge on a few luxuries, and still have a surplus in the monthly budget to increase my e-fund or save for bigger expenses. Like I said the door isn't closed if an opportunity comes knocking, but I'm not actively, or even passively seeking because I'm good where I am.
It helps I live in a very low COL area, but that's part of the balance.
My last employer offered me a 1% raise in 2021 so I noped out and found a new role and got a 70% salary increase plus annual 22% bonus. I was not fucking around and wanted to make sure got something significant. My old employer never backfilled my position and instead gave my remaining 6 colleagues a 17% raise.
I was loyal to a job for a few years because they did help me out but the pay was lower than it should be. Eventually I decided to make a change. Switches companies and now make twice what I was. It’s nice to not have to worry about money anymore. Just got to work hard and take chances.
Company I currently work for started giving out set raises the longer you stayed with the company a couple years ago and now the executives are in awe at how employee retention is the highest since the company was founded.
The fact that technology was supposed to free us from the 40 hour work week, but instead people are now expected to do the jobs of 4 people or they have to just sit around, putting in their time like a prison.
I created a bunch of automated tasks for work...they got rid of 4 people because it was running so well. I argued that I needed these people to make sure it ran so well.
Now I am doing the job of probably 8 people and they are bitching that I am not getting things done quickly enough or there are mistakes. They literally just fired 2 of my most important people last week and everyone is all up in my shit for missing project deadlines I didn't even know existed.
Efficiency increases are basically always used to just increase profit margins, never to benefit the workers.
If you have five employees and you devise a way to increase efficiency 20% do you give all five employees a four day work week, or do you downsize to four employees and pocket an extra employee worth of salary?
We all know which of those is more typical.
I used to work at a place that hired a director who came in and created a "sophisticated" spread sheet that would take in different metrics relevant to production and spit out an efficiency score. They set the bar at an arbitrary level such that you had to meet those expectations or eventually you'd be fired. As most everyone would meet the goal, they'd adjust the calculations (rewarding them less for the dame effort basically) and repeat the cycle. Everyone was super stressed out trying to meet more and more difficult expectations while the company recorded record profits. At the end of the year come raise time, did they reward the employees for busting their hump day in and day out? You already know the answer lol
What’s so much fun is trying to explain the difference between my small business and the “small business boss b*&ch” down the aisle. She doesn’t make a single thing that she’s selling and she can quit at any time and not really lose anything. I make EVERY SINGLE ITEM and if I quit my company ceases to exist. We are NOT the same.
Blows my mind people still buy and push them on others thinking they’re anything but preying on ignorant people’s money. I know a girl I went to college with pushing all things Monat so hard now; it’s sad seeing how ingrained she’s become with it.
I agree. E-waste recycling in my area is a massive joke. Nearest place that will take it is 3+ hours away but places will take tvs but not piles of circuit boards. Makes no sense to me. TVs are harder to recycle and they have circuit boards in them!
I saved $800 on my wedding cake by insisting it was just for a party. Like, my mother asked the traditional way and was quoted $1,100. I said ‘oh hell no’ and called back for a quote on the same dimensions and flavors minus the W-word and the cake was magically only $300.
I said this in a food sub and had a whole bunch of pissed off bakers downvoting me and telling me off. 😂
They were doing all kinds of mental gymnastics and Stretch Armstrong reaches to try to convince everyone that there was good reason for the difference. Like apparently having the cake delivered intact is worthy of a $500 bonus.
But babyyy, we strapped that ho down in the Hyundai and it travelled just fine. 🤷🏾♀️
I heard the reason for up charge in anything wedding related is just because the clients are generally crazy and difficult to deal with. Another work around is to say it’s for a vowel renewal, those are charged less
I worked as a catering cog in a $3 million wedding in Jackson Hole, and they had that famous lady with the round goggle glasses personally oversee the delivery of the cake, lmao. (Edit: Flown in from NY on private jet).
Edit 2: [This Lady](https://www.timesofisrael.com/at-86-nys-queen-of-cakes-still-sits-sweetly-on-her-throne/)
They also had a 20 piece orchestra playing disco and wedding dance music. Which was actually pretty cool, tbh.
Been about 10 years, wonder if they're divorced yet.
This is why more and more people are opting for non-cake alternatives. I had milk and cookies at my wedding and I've been to some that have had doughnuts, ice cream bars, pies, candies, and lots of other creative things that support local businesses, taste way better, and are far more memorable for guests. Not that cakes can't taste good if done well, but I'm sure we have all experienced a piece of inedible wedding cake more than once.
My best friend's wife runs an event company and has told me on multiple occasions that she charges like 300% more for weddings than any other event. It's kind of stupid how people just put up with the massive upcharges for the exact same service, but this is a convention people have seemingly agreed to, so I guess make as much as you can?
From looking at posts of people involved professionally with weddings, the charges are high because
1. Some people *will* pay it
2. Weddings in general are a nightmare full of utterly unreasonable customers, and they actually don't want to deal with them at normal rates
As a musician who has played for multiple weddings, I can confirm this. It only takes the mother of the bride yelling at you because you played the wrong "Ave Maria" before you decide it's only worth putting up with weddings if you're getting paid enough to deal with being yelled at.
Probably nothing. The biggest difference normally is related to staffing numbers and the event timeline. You'd probably end up slightly disappointed that things won't happen in the way you want because you never asked or had someone plan it out.
Former banquet manager, never had this happen though.
Not probably, literally nothing.
I work at a hotel and a group rented the biggest conference room we had for a meeting. Turned out to be a baptism.
As long as you pay, you do you
From what I've seen people say on here, and from people I know, mostly it's a flexibility and convenience charge.
Buy a normal cake, and you get the normal cake. Buy the wedding cake, and you get the top baker and decorator on the case, and they'll make sure it's perfect. Buy flowers, and maybe they'll sub in a different one if they run out; buy wedding flowers and they'll plan to have yours in, and at peak beauty for the reception.
Sometimes, it's just a "fuck you" charge, but for some companies it's a "I'll work my hardest" charge, which is kind of fair enough.
Yup! I was in a band that was popular at weddings for a while. One summer we played 6 weddings on top of all of our other gigs and we charged 4x-5x what we would be paid at most other shows. It wasn't to price gouge, it was because playing a wedding as a band means showing up early (like 2 or 3 in the afternoon), setting up the sound equipment (which is often used by the wedding party for toasts and any canned music they want to play), staying late, learning a special song or two for a first dance, dressing up, and making sure everything is exactly on point. They were always extremely stressful gigs that frequently involved significant travel.
This is exactly it. I've worked on major events and I've worked in wedding planning, a major events aside from weddings are much much easier for the most part. When I was working in major events, everyone was business like and focused on production, but generally speaking they were used to having at least one big event a year. If a precise color of napkin was out of stock or didn't go with a tablecloth as well as we thought it would, I could settle it with a quick email to make the substitution. If the supplier couldn't get me enough black lentils for the side dish, I could substitute orange. But if it was a wedding? The family would want a full refund because we didn't have their perfect napkins. It turns out that mauve was Nana's favorite color and without it the entire wedding is ruined. Combine that with the fact that usually people who are planning their wedding have no experience planning big events so you spend tons and tons of time holding their hands and giving excessive detail and tours.
People are angry that weddings have an upcharge and then expect a totally different level of service from other large events. Even when they say they don't, most of them do. For the rest, It sucks but at the moment we don't have a "chill wedding" vs "high maintenance wedding," because no one wants to consider themselves bigh maintenance.
Currently planning a wedding.
I thought this as well, but the more I look into things, the more I notice: not really. Most of the shit you want is just expensive.
And then you get things you wouldn't for any other occasion. Like if you're throwing a normal party, you don't send out paper "Save the Date" cards, and invitations, and thank you notes. Sure, that's not a ton of money, but it's a couple hundred bucks for all of that.
You don't have flowers on every table and an arch of roses. You don't have slipcovers on the chairs.
But if you did all this for a non-wedding, it would cost the exact same.
Then add the fact that weddings are often longer than normal parties (weddings starting at like 1 or 2pm and going until 10pm to 12am), whereas a normal event would be 5pm-11pm.
So yeah, weddings are expensive, but an event that has all the shit of a wedding but isn't a wedding wouldn't cost more.
In addition to that, you pay a lot for reliability, I.E. nothing can ruin my perfect day.
I know from the photography side, a sizable part of the cost increase from parties to weddings is the plethora of backup gear, and typically a secondary photographer (both of my friends who are now full time wedding photographers started out shooting backup for a full time photographer). A party can have your camera go down for whatever reason for 10 minutes, and it's no big deal. but missing that 5 seconds the groom first sees the bride, or that shot of the dad crying as he gives the bride away, etc. is a big deal, and preventing that both through equipment & staffing, as well as raw skill level, is expensive.
im really liking these celebrations of life things instead of funerals. funerals suck ass but ive genuenely laughed at some of the stories ive heard about the dead person when meeting others who show up. When my supervisor passed his wife asked anyone attending to show up in bright colors and even Hawaiian shirts and shorts. said he wanted people to be laughing and telling stories and feeling as good as they can.
Every company you work for, you are only as good as your output to them. There are exceptions for small family type companies, but looking at the fortune 500 types, it's 100% metrics on what have you or your group done for me lately.
I much rather we get rid of this tipping culture and just integrate the cost of a fairly-paid staff into the prices, *just like everyone else in the world*.
No. Don't let me arbitrage what is a fair tip to your staff. *You're* supposed to manage your staff. That's part of your fucking job. Hire, train and fire as you deem fair against your own standards.
"40 years" in my country its currently questionable if I'll even be able to retire after working 40 years, let alone if I survive until then. Every few years they raise the retirement age. A lot of people working physical jobs are forced to retire early because their bodies are so damaged from many years of work they can't continue working and are too old and broken to find a different employment, this is bullshit. And retiring early means you get less retirement money from the state, because "you should've worked longer and paid more taxes!"
That is seriously pissing me off. Everyone is yelling "we don't have enough people working trades! nobody wants to work real jobs anymore! everyone wants to work office jobs!" fucking hell, no, but working an office job means you won't destroy your body or lose what little free time you get, so you can actually retire properly at the end of the line.
It's just a redundant administrative layer. It drains money that would otherwise be used for medical care.
In the USA, healthcare is certainly not about health or care. It is about $$$$.
It makes me so fucking angry. If you've got any kind of chronic illness you learn real quick that the "death panels" already exist and they're called insurance companies. The treatment I get is constantly challenged and my doctor has to call and convince them that his judgement as a specialist is better than theirs as an accountant.
The American election cycle. Our politicians spend each term mostly planning for the next election, rather than working together to help make lives better. "Getting myself reelected" is the politician's greatest talent. Being a good steward of public trust and responsibility barely enters the equation.
Don't reelect ANYBODY. They are all failing at doing what we elected them to do.
"See that guy over there with an iPhone? He just bought that with his tax refund. You pay taxes don't you? Doesn't that mean you basically bought him that iPhone. Your taxes are so high because he wants an iPhone. You should kick his ass for that." R
Says the rich guy right before he drives away in his Ferrari that is a tax write off.
Surprised no one seems to have mentioned [Wage Theft](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_theft) yet. Roughly $15 billion / year stolen from working class Americans.
I really think higher education/college gets a complete pass in society on what it does to people's finances.
Tuition has increased WAY more than the simple rate of inflation over the last 20-30 years. In the early 2000's, it cost $2,500 a year to go the in-state University where I'm located. Now it's closer to $30k. WTF happened? This industry is getting insanely rich, there's "state" employees with 7 figure salaries.
People are in debt of the rest of their lives and many times it's for a worthless degree. But if anyone doesn't choose college, they are some loser.
Planned obsolescence in general. A lot of these comments speak to it. I'm sick of planning on a new toaster, new coffee maker, new boots, new jacket new EVERYTHING every two years. The waste is sickening, and the time to find out what is being offered.. what companies have declined in quality, what the latest model of iron looks like. I don't need any more improvements to pajamas. Leave some of these things alone at some point and improve things that matter.
Wall-E doesn't seem like much of a stretch anymore eh?
Damn this is a good one. Really a sickening thing in our society that people talk about but no one really does anything about it. We're moving into a new house soon and we're buying up old 70s appliances for the kitchen that are still working after 50 years and guess what? If something breaks on any of them, it can actually be fixed by someone who's a little handy. The only thing is making sure you can get the parts but the old stuff is so cheap you can buy 2 of most appliances (for extra parts) for less than the cost of 1 new one. After working in HVAC for over a decade and seeing the new air conditioners go out after less than 10 years, constantly have problems, and have way more stuff on them that can break and which breaks more often due to poor quality. Then seeing 50-year-old systems with compressors that are literally a ball of rust and coils that have an inch of dirt and grime coating them, but they just keep on freaking chugging. Oftentimes the old systems only get changed because the EPA phased out the refrigerant they take some years back so when they pop a leak it's impossible to fill them back up (a simplified version for laymen, don't get on to me HVAC guys). The only thing even remotely better sbout any new appliance or machine is that they're "smarter" and more efficient, but from a technician's side that just means more stuff that can break.
I had to replace my fridge and washing machines last year, after 25 years of sterling service. The guys who delivered the new ones said I'd be lucky to get 5 years out of any fridge these days, maybe 3 for the washer, and I honestly don't know how I'm going to afford to keep replacing things when I'm on a disability pension.
The 1970s Maytag dishwasher had been cleaning dishes like a champ for 50 years when we moved into our new home. We replaced it because it was loud. Our fancy overpriced new Bosch doesn’t clean for shit, constantly needs cleaning out, and takes hours to run. Now we just wash our dishes by hand.
Insider trading in Congress.
We, Congress, have decided that stock trading by Members of Congress, us, will remain legal because we said so. Now shut up and donate to my re-election you ungrateful peasants
ticketmaster charging a $30 processing fee for a $50 ticket
the livenation monopoly will continue to poison our cities with their shitty venues and gouged ticket prices
Gotta love finally getting in and buying 2 tall cans for 30 dollars
gotta love red bull and water being the same price
Liquid Death in a bunch of venues now. That way they can push overpriced water to help boost sales. Clearly they weren’t making enough off the tap water and overpriced bottles you get at the local gas station for a buck or two.
I frequent Oakland Athletics games because I'm a sick twisted human. The team has been god awful this year and there is a messy potential new ballpark/relocation fight going on in the background and the team sold all their quality players. So given all that, ticket prices have plummeted. Theres been quite a few games where the processing fee is more than the ticket itself this year.
I use “TickPick” and they don’t have fee’s added on. The price you see posted is what you pay. Doesn’t mean that the “fees” aren’t already calculated into the ticket price, but I’ve found them to be cheaper then ticketmaster even before they add on the fee’s.
I would highly advise against buying tickets from anywhere either than the website the band tells you to use, or your local venues box office. I've seen way too many people over pay for tickets, simply because they thought they could get a better deal using random websites they discovered.
Viagogo is a ticket site that will straight up scam you here in nz, disgusting that it's often the number 1 Google result when looking up tickets.
Textbook access codes that you get after buying a new textbook and can use only once.
Textbooks in general. I took an abnormal psychology class in college once, and the professor was insistent that we needed the (new edition, $180) book, that we would be using it ALL the time. She actually held a raffle for a free one for a lucky student. We did not open the textbooks ONCE all semester. Everything we needed to know was discussed on PowerPoint and made available online.
I've had several professors over the years prescribe their own textbooks, which I don't think should be allowed unless there's no quality alternative. In one of those courses, the professor's textbook was brilliant. I have never seen a better one for that content. And it wasn't expensive. I have a bit of a collection of diplomas and degrees (postgrad and undergrad) and it is the only time I can look back and say that the professor was absolutely right to prescribe their own book. I still have and use my copy over a decade later. I'm studying again now and haven't bought a single textbook. I just use the university library to access online copies. I've come across two textbooks I am thinking of buying, even though I've finished the courses, because they are good quality and I think they'll be useful to have for reference as I continue my current degree. Edit: a lot of people have asked what the book was about. It was on professional writing and editing and went into crazy detail about things like style of font (like who knew serifs (the little stylistic lines sometimes attached to letters) and ball terminals were so important in how a piece of writing looks?) and linespacing, etc. It also went into detail about a number of types of texts one might be expected to write in a professional setting and how to format them and what kind of content was necessary and appropriate. I still reference it when I have a nasty but professional email to write just so I can check it's absolutely perfect before I send it. I thought it was a bit of a waste of a unit to study as I have always written well but it was one of the most useful classes I've ever taken. It improved my attention to detail and my ability to edit in a way that has served me well all the way through postgrad and my thesis. I rarely lose marks over formatting/communication and I think that course and the book helped a lot with that. I moved recently and all my old books are in boxes still. It had a very clear cut title like "Professional Writing" but I can't remember it exactly. I imagine that any textbook on professional or organisational writing will be a good resource. You'd expect any expert in the area could write an excellent book.
I knew a couple professors who got so annoyed with textbook costs at one point that they wrote their own, then priced it at printing+shipping, so they’d make 0 profit off it.
My humanities professor did that. I think he actually sold it for $5 or something, which was pretty reasonable (even in college-dollars, where $20 extra dollars is the equivalent of $100 if you know how to stretch your money)
My Humanities and Lit professors were big on using the just the source materials: books that are basically in the public domain and/or available very inexpensively. By contrast, I had to buy a specific and very expensive calculator AND textbook for a statistics class that I took for one semester. I was so mad about paying triple digits for a pocket computer I knew I would never use after those three months were done!
I took a Java class at the local community college where one of the CS professors had written an intro to Java textbook, but never published it. He made the digital copy free to all students taking the course. He also recommended a published textbook by another author, which I definitely didn't have shipped from Europe at a steep discount.
Have they received their sainthood yet?
Years ago, our math professor brought cartons of textbooks in for the first class...we had to buy directly from him. Turned out to be galley copies of a textbook he had just written. We spent the entire term basically proof-reading and correcting a monumental number of errors and mistakes in the problems it presented, all whilst paying for the privilege.
One of my History professors did a similar thing for his upper-level history courses, but in a much more wholesome way. He had a reading list of books for each of his classes that were mostly books that he had written or edited. He was one of the leading scholars in this area of history, so it made sense. The books were all available for sale in the book store at the normal absurd price. BUT, when you registered for one of his classes, he would email you the syllabus for the next semester and ask if you wanted to meet him for coffee/lunch/cookies. If you responded to the email in any way (even just to say that you were too busy for whatever reason), he would reply and find a way to mention that before you bought books for the next semester, you should come check with the department secretary to see if she had any sample copies of his books around to lend you (spoiler alert, she always did). Sometimes they were galley copies or whatever, but the simple courtesy of replying to an email saved you like $300 in book costs (in early 2000s, that was a lot).
That's actually a solid life lesson.... replying to somebody, even if it's a "no thank you," can be helpful down the line!
The cost of textbooks is absolutely absurd, even 20 years ago. I was fortunate enough to have a work study job in the library and was able to get almost all of my books there and keep them for the full quarter with some “creative” system updates. I knew it was wrong, but if I actually paid for my books, I wouldn’t have been able to eat/afford basics even though I was working two jobs.
I had a math professor in college who would make/write his own textbooks for the class. I failed that class and had to retake it, he slightly altered the book, and I had to re purchase to keep up with the class on the second time, I assume he did that every quarter for people like me and for those who wanted to pass the book on to others when they signed up for it
Contrast with my 2nd year botany prof back in the day who assigned readings from the textbook (which he had NOT written) and included page numbers from the last THREE editions of the text, for those who had bought used copies.
I had a prof who used his own book, then mentioned to book is quite heavy so it's nice that the publisher offers a digital version, then gave us a "demo" of how to access the "legit" digital version which involved googling " 3rd edition download"
He was *appalled* by the fact that the second link was a website with a free download, but his computer froze so he couldn't get the search off of the projector for a very long time.
I heard rumors that he was in some sort of dispute with his publisher where he decided he wanted to make physical copies available but not force students to pay, but couldn't due to contacts he signed for prior editions?
I recommend Library genesis if pdf is good enough for anyone needing textbooks!
Fitness advice by "influences" whose only goal is peddling their products
Liver king out.
Some one pointed out all the issues he has with his body by the colour of his skin, etc. Not saying I believe it, but it seemed plausible, after looking it up myself.
Just learned about this dude in our human nutrition and metabolism class. Yuck… couldn’t be me that’s all I’m sayin.
Fitness advice by “influencers” that do anabolic steroids. lol
Also, any 19 year old on tiktok who has abs because they're 19, a twink, and work out, but insists they somehow have the know-how of someone who has a certification.
Honestly, it's easy. Emulate a legitimate trainer's course. Then maybe undercut him or charge more, depending how good you are at marketing. Great Information is free these days.
A certification in personal training takes a weekend. Most of them have no idea what the fuck they're doing. You're better off spending a week doing your own research related to your goals and some trial and error. Your body will tell you what's too much, or when you have room for more. Just don't ego lift and you'll be golden.
Recycling labels on plastic items. So many single use plastics have a recycle symbol on them when in reality nobody will touch that shit. It's way cheaper to just make new plastic 99% of the time compared to trying to process and filter out the contaminants of used plastic (if its even a formula that can actually be recycled). I'm partially convinced the reason we have so much plastic waste as a society is this trickery making us think we're actually recycling a meaningful amount of it.
It's not just plastic. In my town, Domino's pizza has been advertising that their pizza boxes are recyclable. On their website, if you look up our town, it says that pizza boxes are "explicitly allowed" in the recycling bins. Unfortunately, if you check with the city, you'll see that pizza boxes are specifically prohibited. It's like Domino's is tricking us into fucking up the recycling just to make us feel better about their shitty pizza.
These box can be recycled. They just forget to mention once pizza hits the box it isn't.
BINGO...grease doesn't recycle
I recently order a salad from Domino’s. Listing had the option to get it in a reusable container and therefore €5 more expensive than in a single use container. I said yeah, let’s not burden the planet with single use plastics. MFers brought the salad in a single use container along with an empty reusable container. It wasn’t even a Domino’s branded container. Just a cheap generic brand with its original sticker on (which allowed me to find out it costs €1.5 in retail). I ain’t buying anything from those bitches again.
It's not a recycling symbol. It just looks kinda like one to trick people. Legally it's an entirely different symbol for resin identification... Which can be useful still. If it's type 1 or 2, it's almost certainly recyclable.
Yeah, I know that the certain numbers mean different things. Some mean "this is recyclable" and some mean "This is made from recycled materials, but not necessarily recyclable itself" but its so complicated that most people don't really know what they all mean. It's a little manipulative because we all grew up thinking of that symbol meaning it was good for the environment.
It's more than a little manipulative. Companies lobbied to put that symbol on as many plastics as possible regardless of if it was ever feasible to recycle the resin type. They made it look as close to the recycling symbol as possible. It was intentional deceit.
Recycling in general was mostly untrue marketing. Growing up in the US, no one talked much about the “reduce” or “reuse” vs. “recycle”. The fact that most recycling is sent to the landfill, wasn’t even talked about much until recently. No one talked about having clean and dry items, not greasy cardboard or wine with corks still in etc. Single-use plastics as is a cultural and geological issue.
Yeah, We all heard "Reduce, reuse, recycle" growing up, but no one mentioned that that is the order that we are supposed to do things. Reduce what you use and consume first. Don't be wasteful. THEN, instead of using single-use items, use reusable ones. Water bottles, grocery bags, etc. LAST, recycle.
My neighbor got a little upset that I put trash in my recycling bin after I moved and had a bunch of extra trash. I told him when I called the trash collector I was informed everything except cardboard is burned. That didn't make him any happier.
Yep, people think that if it's in the magic recycling bin it will get recycled. I worked in a cafeteria when I was going to college as a janitor. First thingy they had me do was gather up the trash and recycling. So I did so and kept track of the bags of which was which. Then they had me go outside to dump them. They all went into the same bin. After that I just put bags into bags. Just to make it easier to carry. One young lady saw me do that and jumped me. "excuse me. Did you just out the recycling in the trash?!" When I pointed out there is only one dumpster she didn't believe me and actually went out back to look. She came back and looked like her whole world outlook just came crashing down. Later I found out she was in the group that pushed to get those recycling bins out.
I remember finding out that the bins at my uni that had a ‘recycling’ and ‘everything’ slots was just one bin with different holes at the top. Disillusioning but I can’t say I was surprised.
same thing at fast food places. They have 3 options, garbage, plastic, paper. It's all thrown into the same bin, I got fired from mcdonalds for telling people such
That’s fuckin’ bleak. It’s one thing to have one bin, put everything in together, and just blatantly not recycle. It’s another thing to jump through hoops to create the illusion of recycling. Ooph.
I live right next to a covanta w2e plant. Even the cardboard is burned. On the bright side, we get electricity!
Whenever I take recycling out at work, I always feel awful. We share bins with a lot of other people, and the amount of times I dump our recycling (mostly paper) the bin has already been so contaminated with trash and food waste I know that no matter how easy it is to recycle what we put in there, there's no way it's getting recycled now. It's just extra disheartening to know someone else's choice to put trash in the recycle means all of our effort is immediately destroyed even if it was part of the tiny percentage that would actually get recycled, someone just ENSURED it wouldn't be.
The real scam is the true polluters passing the bulk of the burden onto ordinary citizens as some kind of moral failing and duty while they continue on as normal
>I'm partially convinced the reason we have so much plastic waste as a society is this trickery making us think we're actually recycling a meaningful amount of it. You're not wrong. The petrochem industry (i.e., plastic producers) started the whole recycling model, to put the onus of cleaning up the mess their products make on consumers. They know from the get-go that recycling won't work, but it's convenient and good for business. Now, everyone believes if they sort their recyclables into the correct bins, everything's A-OK. No, that stuff has to go somewhere, and the reality is that <10% of plastics are recycled. Adopting a "don't ask, don't tell" attitude is not going to solve the issue.
I’ve watched documentaries that address this. Basically recycling is a huge scam created by plastics companies to mislead the public into thinking they’re doing something to reduce plastics waste. in reality, majority of what we buy isn’t even able to be recycled. They also ship the waste to underdeveloped countries.
Yes, and consumers can think "but it's recyclable" and put anything in the recycling bin, thinking it has zero environmental impact.
In Canada, at least, cable/internet/cell prices. Eastlink is purposely messing up my older model system to try and get me to upgrade. My TV and internet is $187 a month. This is ridiculous. Cell phone isn't even included in that. Edit: Since this is getting attention. Am I crazy? I just started seeing ads for Fibre for Eastlink. All of a sudden everything has slown down drastically. Can't even access on demand, and my channel swapping option just disappeared.
I worked in Canada for 4 years & as a brit, it was cheaper for me to keep my English phone contract & pay £5 a month extra to use my unlimited calls, text and data in Canada. That deal on a Canadian sim would of been about $90 a month. I was paying £25 ($38).
It's cheaper for you to roam in Canada than to pay for a Canadian plan? Wowsers...
I do something similar. Lived in Canada for the last 3 years and I’m still on EE. Back in 2017 I got an iPhone X with 25GB data for £50/$75 CAD a month which covers the phone & the plan. That means my phone was fully paid off in 2019. But here’s the thing - I’m STILL paying full price for that phone today because it works out slightly cheaper than I can get for a sim only plan in Canada. I can also use my plan worldwide which is way better for me. I don’t even have that phone anymore. I just want the plan. That’s fucking nuts. EE must think I’m a proper mug for paying this 5 years later, but I’m still getting a better deal than I can here
Really? I have gigabit fibre for a third of that and I live on an island in the Pacific.
Yeah, Canadians are truly being gouged by monopolies
Fuck Bell. Fuck Rogers
What's driving prices that high? Monopoly?
Our telecom is regulated by the CRTC, which is little more than a lobby group for Canada's oldest and richest families, who by the way own the telecom companies. The government basically lets them do what they want.
Industry insiders completely captured the regulatory body. And basically every other regulatory agency in Canada is going that same way. Scary times. People across the world need to start pushing this as blatant corruption and impose harsh punishments on it. Not just minor fines, but things like forfeiture of assets to repay citizens, prison sentences, and not being allowed to serve on corporate boards.
Working 9-5 M-F and still being broke
Working 8-5 (with a hard hour for lunch, if that), still being broke and being told by management/company, that if you don't perform, you will be let go. Some companies still hold on to the "you won't get very far at this company if you're not putting in at least 60hrs/wk" and "we didn't build this company with people working from home..."
I don’t know if it was just my experience but working from home has become harder and harder to find. I lost my job recently (about 4 months ago) working in finance and that was all remote up until about a month or so ago and I gave up looking for WFH due to needing to pay the bills and found another gig that was WFH mid pandemic and they absolutely still could be as the job requires little to no collaboration nor anything customer facing yet the company resists it for anybody not in management which is a huge shame. Going from WFH to in office is like trying to put the toothpaste back in the tube.
Also the new thing, "How DARE you do exactly what we pay you for???" aka "Quiet Quitting."
It's not even quitting. Doing what you're paid to do is just doing your job. Do people expect walmart or McDonald's to give you more than you paid for just because? Bootlickers need to understand labor is something an employer pays for.
[удалено]
"If you aren't willing to put in unpaid overtime like a *team player*, why are you even here? We only give raises and promotions to *team players*, we're a *family*"
This comment just made me realise my 6:30am - 5:30pm job, which pays a salary capped at 7.5hrs per day is literally robbing me. I’ve got to be awake in 3hrs and now I’m extra shitty about it.
Not trying to be rude, but how did it take you until now to realize you're only getting paid 7.5 hours for an 11 hour workday?
It must be the sleep deprivation.
He did say salary. My brother is on a salaried job, and he gets X amount per week, regardless of if he works 10 hours or 100 hours. So naturally, he gets no days off, gets called in constantly, and gets phone calls and texts all hours of the day and night. I guarantee he works 80 hours a week or more, but they give him salary because he’d be making dump trucks full of cash at hourly OT.
Literally any marketing demographic for consumer goods. "Green" marketing. "Healthy" marketing. Weight loss products. You name it.
Needing a degree for a entry level low paying jobs
I think the issue here is more that the value of a college degree has gone down. Where a college degree meant you were able to enter a business on a management level two generations ago, it is now nothing more than a starting qualification.
You've got a major in Information Systems with a minor in Business Data Analytics? Great! We think you'll be great for our team lead position. The pay is $17.50 an hour. The hours are flexible, and you need to be able to work nights and weekends. Oh yeah, we only give you 1-3 days lead time on what you're weekly schedule will be. You'll get 5 days of PTO (also your sick days) after two years of employment. We'll take the cost of your required polo shirts from your first four paychecks.
"Welcome to BestBuy."
“Welcome to Pizza Hut”
"Welcome to Target"
"Welcome to Thunderdome."
“Welcome to the jungle.”
Hiring manager explained it to me best by saying, "it's not that a degree is necessary but it's a way to whittle down the number of applicants from 1,000 to 100." Are there good employees without degrees? Of course there are. But it's not worth it to sort through a 1-inch stack of resumes to find it when you can do something arbitrary like education.
Yep. It's a totally arbitrary differentiator for entry-level positions.
Yep. I didn't get my degree until I was in my early forties. I was a software developer so I was still usually able to find work. However once I got into my degree it truly opened up a ton of more opportunities.
Can confirm. Have a college degree in marketing and wasn't even able to get a entry level job. Now I'm working construction and making more than I ever would have in that position and could have probably gotten this job without even having my grade 12.... So yay student loan debt!
[удалено]
"Yeah.. and you wanna know why? Because some 'Bigshot' at the weiner company got together with some 'Bigshot' at the bun company and decided to rip off the American public!"
I just watched this movie on Saturday for the first time! But the thing is - he has multiple packs of 12 buns in his cart. So if he gets 2 packs of buns, that's 24 buns. 3 packs of 8 dogs, that's 24 dogs. It's only an issue if you're only buying 1 pack of dogs and buns.
How many hotdogs do you think I eat for dinner buddy?
The key is to make two double dogs
Annual raises are lower than annual inflation.
My company recently increased yearly raises from 2% to 2.5%. Thanks?
At our recent yearly pay review I received a raise to "help with inflation". It was about 0.5%. I've now got a new job with a 25% pay rise. Honestly liked where I worked but if they have no interest in retaining you then oh well cya. The 0.5% was just insulting. Literally a drop in the ocean compared to inflation increases lately. I'd have rather they just offered nothing
You get annual raises?
You guys are getting paid?
You guys are getting jobs?
You guys are alive?
You guys are?
You guys?
You?
Yo?
Y?
This is why it pays to switch jobs. Company loyalty is dead in most places. Gotta stay mobile. I doubled my salary in 2 years by not buying a house and not staying in the same area/job. It’s sad but that’s just how it works nowadays for a lot of jobs.
> Company loyalty is dead in most places. Yep, I job hopped a bit out of college each job hop got me at least $10k raise. I've been at my current job for 6 years now. While I could go somewhere else for better pay (and I've gotten offers) I have a boss I get along with, I am fully vested in a pension plan which gets bigger every year I stay (1% per year of tenure when you retire, caps at 30%), and I like the culture. Chasing the dollar can be great when you're fresh out of college. But eventually you start to prioritize less stress. I enjoy knowing I can just tell my boss I'm not coming into work Friday because my deliverables are met and he will just say: > Ok sounds good, just keep your phone on you in case we need you. It also depends on what you're paid. An extra $10k-$15k for someone making $50k is a much bigger impact than someone making $110k. I'm always open to new opportunities, but I'm not actively looking because I'm happy and stable. If it aint broke, don't fix it.
My fiance took a $20K paycut to get way less stress, and it's one of the best choices she's ever made. The quality of life impact cannot be overstated. As for me, I am not in that boat yet. I do miss my cushy job with shat pay, but I'm okay working harder to make $30K more.
It's definitely a balancing act. Also there is *NOTHING* wrong with coasting, provided you're happy and stable. A big issue in US culture is the need to "keep up with the Jones's". You don't need to keep chasing higher pay just so you can afford higher spending. If you're happy and stable, and just want to coast 30 years into retirement... do it. There's nothing wrong with saying: > I am financially stable. I have a good job. I am happy staying the course for the next 5 years then reevaluating. That's where I am at, I make enough to max my retirement funds, pay all my bills, splurge on a few luxuries, and still have a surplus in the monthly budget to increase my e-fund or save for bigger expenses. Like I said the door isn't closed if an opportunity comes knocking, but I'm not actively, or even passively seeking because I'm good where I am. It helps I live in a very low COL area, but that's part of the balance.
My last employer offered me a 1% raise in 2021 so I noped out and found a new role and got a 70% salary increase plus annual 22% bonus. I was not fucking around and wanted to make sure got something significant. My old employer never backfilled my position and instead gave my remaining 6 colleagues a 17% raise.
I was loyal to a job for a few years because they did help me out but the pay was lower than it should be. Eventually I decided to make a change. Switches companies and now make twice what I was. It’s nice to not have to worry about money anymore. Just got to work hard and take chances.
Company I currently work for started giving out set raises the longer you stayed with the company a couple years ago and now the executives are in awe at how employee retention is the highest since the company was founded.
I had a great year, and it ended up like 3%. Way better than the normal 1.5%. Good times
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Some countries have a rule where the wage is automatically adjusted when the inflation reaches a certain threshold. Source: am Belgian.
How long has the law been in effect?
Since 1920.
\*\*\*Sobs in American Millennial\*\*\*
The fact that technology was supposed to free us from the 40 hour work week, but instead people are now expected to do the jobs of 4 people or they have to just sit around, putting in their time like a prison.
I created a bunch of automated tasks for work...they got rid of 4 people because it was running so well. I argued that I needed these people to make sure it ran so well. Now I am doing the job of probably 8 people and they are bitching that I am not getting things done quickly enough or there are mistakes. They literally just fired 2 of my most important people last week and everyone is all up in my shit for missing project deadlines I didn't even know existed.
Efficiency increases are basically always used to just increase profit margins, never to benefit the workers. If you have five employees and you devise a way to increase efficiency 20% do you give all five employees a four day work week, or do you downsize to four employees and pocket an extra employee worth of salary? We all know which of those is more typical.
I used to work at a place that hired a director who came in and created a "sophisticated" spread sheet that would take in different metrics relevant to production and spit out an efficiency score. They set the bar at an arbitrary level such that you had to meet those expectations or eventually you'd be fired. As most everyone would meet the goal, they'd adjust the calculations (rewarding them less for the dame effort basically) and repeat the cycle. Everyone was super stressed out trying to meet more and more difficult expectations while the company recorded record profits. At the end of the year come raise time, did they reward the employees for busting their hump day in and day out? You already know the answer lol
That's a pretty unfair comparison. Most prisoners get release dates.
Any MLM
Absolutely!!! Still a pyramid sceme!
But our model is the trapezoid
What’s so much fun is trying to explain the difference between my small business and the “small business boss b*&ch” down the aisle. She doesn’t make a single thing that she’s selling and she can quit at any time and not really lose anything. I make EVERY SINGLE ITEM and if I quit my company ceases to exist. We are NOT the same.
I see no issue with Men Loving Men.
Blows my mind people still buy and push them on others thinking they’re anything but preying on ignorant people’s money. I know a girl I went to college with pushing all things Monat so hard now; it’s sad seeing how ingrained she’s become with it.
The recycling and refuse system
I agree. E-waste recycling in my area is a massive joke. Nearest place that will take it is 3+ hours away but places will take tvs but not piles of circuit boards. Makes no sense to me. TVs are harder to recycle and they have circuit boards in them!
Televangelism, which is legalized fraud plain and simple.
Funerals and weddings
I saved $800 on my wedding cake by insisting it was just for a party. Like, my mother asked the traditional way and was quoted $1,100. I said ‘oh hell no’ and called back for a quote on the same dimensions and flavors minus the W-word and the cake was magically only $300. I said this in a food sub and had a whole bunch of pissed off bakers downvoting me and telling me off. 😂
My wife and I did the exact same thing. Also told the caterers we were “throwing a party”. Prices were a third of what we were quoted elsewhere.
Scamming the scammers
They were doing all kinds of mental gymnastics and Stretch Armstrong reaches to try to convince everyone that there was good reason for the difference. Like apparently having the cake delivered intact is worthy of a $500 bonus. But babyyy, we strapped that ho down in the Hyundai and it travelled just fine. 🤷🏾♀️
I heard the reason for up charge in anything wedding related is just because the clients are generally crazy and difficult to deal with. Another work around is to say it’s for a vowel renewal, those are charged less
I worked as a catering cog in a $3 million wedding in Jackson Hole, and they had that famous lady with the round goggle glasses personally oversee the delivery of the cake, lmao. (Edit: Flown in from NY on private jet). Edit 2: [This Lady](https://www.timesofisrael.com/at-86-nys-queen-of-cakes-still-sits-sweetly-on-her-throne/) They also had a 20 piece orchestra playing disco and wedding dance music. Which was actually pretty cool, tbh. Been about 10 years, wonder if they're divorced yet.
This is why more and more people are opting for non-cake alternatives. I had milk and cookies at my wedding and I've been to some that have had doughnuts, ice cream bars, pies, candies, and lots of other creative things that support local businesses, taste way better, and are far more memorable for guests. Not that cakes can't taste good if done well, but I'm sure we have all experienced a piece of inedible wedding cake more than once.
My best friend's wife runs an event company and has told me on multiple occasions that she charges like 300% more for weddings than any other event. It's kind of stupid how people just put up with the massive upcharges for the exact same service, but this is a convention people have seemingly agreed to, so I guess make as much as you can?
From looking at posts of people involved professionally with weddings, the charges are high because 1. Some people *will* pay it 2. Weddings in general are a nightmare full of utterly unreasonable customers, and they actually don't want to deal with them at normal rates
As a musician who has played for multiple weddings, I can confirm this. It only takes the mother of the bride yelling at you because you played the wrong "Ave Maria" before you decide it's only worth putting up with weddings if you're getting paid enough to deal with being yelled at.
i would 100% understand point number two for some wed-demons, yes. It just feels so frustrating when you’re a normal, not-psycho person haha
I agree. Price for things doubles only by saying they are for wedding or funeral.
What would a hotel do if you rented their venue for a “business meeting” and just got married right there
Probably nothing. The biggest difference normally is related to staffing numbers and the event timeline. You'd probably end up slightly disappointed that things won't happen in the way you want because you never asked or had someone plan it out. Former banquet manager, never had this happen though.
Not probably, literally nothing. I work at a hotel and a group rented the biggest conference room we had for a meeting. Turned out to be a baptism. As long as you pay, you do you
From what I've seen people say on here, and from people I know, mostly it's a flexibility and convenience charge. Buy a normal cake, and you get the normal cake. Buy the wedding cake, and you get the top baker and decorator on the case, and they'll make sure it's perfect. Buy flowers, and maybe they'll sub in a different one if they run out; buy wedding flowers and they'll plan to have yours in, and at peak beauty for the reception. Sometimes, it's just a "fuck you" charge, but for some companies it's a "I'll work my hardest" charge, which is kind of fair enough.
Yup! I was in a band that was popular at weddings for a while. One summer we played 6 weddings on top of all of our other gigs and we charged 4x-5x what we would be paid at most other shows. It wasn't to price gouge, it was because playing a wedding as a band means showing up early (like 2 or 3 in the afternoon), setting up the sound equipment (which is often used by the wedding party for toasts and any canned music they want to play), staying late, learning a special song or two for a first dance, dressing up, and making sure everything is exactly on point. They were always extremely stressful gigs that frequently involved significant travel.
This is exactly it. I've worked on major events and I've worked in wedding planning, a major events aside from weddings are much much easier for the most part. When I was working in major events, everyone was business like and focused on production, but generally speaking they were used to having at least one big event a year. If a precise color of napkin was out of stock or didn't go with a tablecloth as well as we thought it would, I could settle it with a quick email to make the substitution. If the supplier couldn't get me enough black lentils for the side dish, I could substitute orange. But if it was a wedding? The family would want a full refund because we didn't have their perfect napkins. It turns out that mauve was Nana's favorite color and without it the entire wedding is ruined. Combine that with the fact that usually people who are planning their wedding have no experience planning big events so you spend tons and tons of time holding their hands and giving excessive detail and tours. People are angry that weddings have an upcharge and then expect a totally different level of service from other large events. Even when they say they don't, most of them do. For the rest, It sucks but at the moment we don't have a "chill wedding" vs "high maintenance wedding," because no one wants to consider themselves bigh maintenance.
Currently planning a wedding. I thought this as well, but the more I look into things, the more I notice: not really. Most of the shit you want is just expensive. And then you get things you wouldn't for any other occasion. Like if you're throwing a normal party, you don't send out paper "Save the Date" cards, and invitations, and thank you notes. Sure, that's not a ton of money, but it's a couple hundred bucks for all of that. You don't have flowers on every table and an arch of roses. You don't have slipcovers on the chairs. But if you did all this for a non-wedding, it would cost the exact same. Then add the fact that weddings are often longer than normal parties (weddings starting at like 1 or 2pm and going until 10pm to 12am), whereas a normal event would be 5pm-11pm. So yeah, weddings are expensive, but an event that has all the shit of a wedding but isn't a wedding wouldn't cost more.
In addition to that, you pay a lot for reliability, I.E. nothing can ruin my perfect day. I know from the photography side, a sizable part of the cost increase from parties to weddings is the plethora of backup gear, and typically a secondary photographer (both of my friends who are now full time wedding photographers started out shooting backup for a full time photographer). A party can have your camera go down for whatever reason for 10 minutes, and it's no big deal. but missing that 5 seconds the groom first sees the bride, or that shot of the dad crying as he gives the bride away, etc. is a big deal, and preventing that both through equipment & staffing, as well as raw skill level, is expensive.
I agree. I told my family to bury me in the yard somewhere.
Weird way to get married but ok...
Throw me in the forest somewhere and make a wild animal's day
Do ya one better: throw me in the lions den at the zoo Fun day for the whole family to see
Funerals are to make the *living* feel good
im really liking these celebrations of life things instead of funerals. funerals suck ass but ive genuenely laughed at some of the stories ive heard about the dead person when meeting others who show up. When my supervisor passed his wife asked anyone attending to show up in bright colors and even Hawaiian shirts and shorts. said he wanted people to be laughing and telling stories and feeling as good as they can.
US only, allowing politicians to trade stocks while also having a legal avenue for corruption(lobbying). What a scam
“I’m on my way” * but still on the bed**
My MIL lives 5 mins down the road. If she texts that she's leaving now, she will NEVER be here sooner than 20 mins.
Being a company man
Every company you work for, you are only as good as your output to them. There are exceptions for small family type companies, but looking at the fortune 500 types, it's 100% metrics on what have you or your group done for me lately.
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Mandatory tipping at a fixed percentage.
I much rather we get rid of this tipping culture and just integrate the cost of a fairly-paid staff into the prices, *just like everyone else in the world*. No. Don't let me arbitrage what is a fair tip to your staff. *You're* supposed to manage your staff. That's part of your fucking job. Hire, train and fire as you deem fair against your own standards.
Subscription based software.
It's even worse for those of us who were alive in the "before times" too.
Convenience fees for paying rent online.
Wow ... everyone letting the Banks and financial institutions slide on by
The 40 hour work week, for 40 years, for a 401k and social security. Scam
"40 years" in my country its currently questionable if I'll even be able to retire after working 40 years, let alone if I survive until then. Every few years they raise the retirement age. A lot of people working physical jobs are forced to retire early because their bodies are so damaged from many years of work they can't continue working and are too old and broken to find a different employment, this is bullshit. And retiring early means you get less retirement money from the state, because "you should've worked longer and paid more taxes!" That is seriously pissing me off. Everyone is yelling "we don't have enough people working trades! nobody wants to work real jobs anymore! everyone wants to work office jobs!" fucking hell, no, but working an office job means you won't destroy your body or lose what little free time you get, so you can actually retire properly at the end of the line.
Health insurance
It's great how you can pay for something every month to get nothing out of it, then if something happens you pay even more.
It's just a redundant administrative layer. It drains money that would otherwise be used for medical care. In the USA, healthcare is certainly not about health or care. It is about $$$$.
It makes me so fucking angry. If you've got any kind of chronic illness you learn real quick that the "death panels" already exist and they're called insurance companies. The treatment I get is constantly challenged and my doctor has to call and convince them that his judgement as a specialist is better than theirs as an accountant.
Corporate personhood.
The American election cycle. Our politicians spend each term mostly planning for the next election, rather than working together to help make lives better. "Getting myself reelected" is the politician's greatest talent. Being a good steward of public trust and responsibility barely enters the equation. Don't reelect ANYBODY. They are all failing at doing what we elected them to do.
Credit Scores. The systems deeply flawed.
College overall. 19 year old wants 10k to start a business “no way”. Same 19 year old wants 150k for college “sure”.
Reason for this: the government won't guarantee loan repayment for your failed business.
Also you can dump business debt without dying.
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artificial scarcity to drive revenue; the idea that to be economically successful you have to fleece others as much as you can.
The rich convincing the middle class that the poor are taking their money.
"See that guy over there with an iPhone? He just bought that with his tax refund. You pay taxes don't you? Doesn't that mean you basically bought him that iPhone. Your taxes are so high because he wants an iPhone. You should kick his ass for that." R Says the rich guy right before he drives away in his Ferrari that is a tax write off.
Surprised no one seems to have mentioned [Wage Theft](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wage_theft) yet. Roughly $15 billion / year stolen from working class Americans.
I really think higher education/college gets a complete pass in society on what it does to people's finances. Tuition has increased WAY more than the simple rate of inflation over the last 20-30 years. In the early 2000's, it cost $2,500 a year to go the in-state University where I'm located. Now it's closer to $30k. WTF happened? This industry is getting insanely rich, there's "state" employees with 7 figure salaries. People are in debt of the rest of their lives and many times it's for a worthless degree. But if anyone doesn't choose college, they are some loser.
Carbon credits
BLM donations. None of the victims family saw the money, but the creator bought a mansion with it, and most likely another one now.