Superstore staff in Alberta vote in favour of strike action

[topfiverecords]

Originally Posted by btimbit

There's an art to everything. Doesn't matter if you bag groceries, stock shelves, paint crosswalks, or design buildings. You're no better than anyone else

Completing work tasks while reading/posting on CP at the same time is the ultimate skilled worker.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by jayswin

What? what does fulfilling have to do with it? People are trying to live and feed their families on these jobs.

Also, if you talk to everyone in the working world it seems that 70-80% of people working anywhere feel unfulfilled with their employment. It certainly isn't entry level job exclusive.

I mean that I don't think it is a necessary function of retail. We need to become more efficient and provide better job and skilled opportunities to people than stocking shelves or picking packages in an Amazon warehouse.

I'm actually for universal basic income to ensure that everybody is taken care of at a basic level for food and shelter so that they can focus on developing themselves and have time for their families. This is going to become more and more of a problem as the world automates and nothing is going to change that momentum. In a decade if transport unions go on strike, they may all be replaced with driverless trucks. UBI and other programs are needed to to adapt.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by Yamer

I'm sure eating is pretty fulfilling.

My father slaved the overnight shift stocking shelves at a grocery store to pay our bills when he was laid off in O&G in the 90s. He says his back still hurts today from back then.

I am actually for universal basic income so that there are other options for people to ensure their basic needs are covered.

[Cecil Terwilliger]

What does UBI have to do with grocery store cashiers and stocking shelves? If you introduce UBI, the need for the other two doesn’t disappear. Not sure how you’re connecting them to be related.

[dino7c]

I would be considered a "skilled" worker but you wouldn't want me working your till or bagging your groceries because it would take forever and I would totally suck at it to the point of running out of the building crying most likely.

Even when I have to bag my own things people are often asking to play though.

[btimbit]

Originally Posted by topfiverecords

Completing work tasks while reading/posting on CP at the same time is the ultimate skilled worker.

That's why I work nights, so much easier to keep up with CP and reddit

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by Cecil Terwilliger

What does UBI have to do with grocery store cashiers and stocking shelves? If you introduce UBI, the need for the other two doesn’t disappear. Not sure how you’re connecting them to be related.

Eventually jobs like retail cashiers and truckers are going to fully disappear as they are unneeded and will be replaced by robots and automation. Many stores are even experimenting with shelf stocking/inventory scanning robots. This was pretty much Andrew Wang's platform a few years ago. The point of UBI is to cover basic needs for people who work those jobs that are being automated and provide them opportunities for development and quality of life.

My office building got rid of several cleaning crews and replaced them with robot floor polisher units (think Industrial Roomba). It's happening and we need alternatives for gainful employment and self fulfillment.

[Traditional_Ale]

Let them eat cake!

Seriously, though, good on the workers for standing up for this. The $2.00 raise should never have been clawed back. What a PR disaster for Superstore.

[Dynamic]

Originally Posted by dino7c

I would be considered a "skilled" worker but you wouldn't want me working your till or bagging your groceries because it would take forever and I would totally suck at it to the point of running out of the building crying most likely.

Even when I have to bag my own things people are often asking to play though.

Pro tip, get those plastic boxes. I used to be horrible at bagging groceries. I bought four of those yellow plastics totes and I’m the fastest guy at checkout. Not sure if you guys have those out there.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

Eventually jobs like retail cashiers and truckers are going to fully disappear as they are unneeded and will be replaced by robots and automation. Many stores are even experimenting with shelf stocking/inventory scanning robots. This was pretty much Andrew Wang's platform a few years ago. The point of UBI is to cover basic needs for people who work those jobs that are being automated and provide them opportunities for development and quality of life.

My office building got rid of several cleaning crews and replaced them with robot floor polisher units (think Industrial Roomba). It's happening and we need alternatives for gainful employment and self fulfillment.

What does any of this have to do with human beings who are currently employed trying to be reasonably compensated before their jobs are eliminated as you’re suggesting?

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

What does any of this have to do with human beings who are currently employed trying to be reasonably compensated before their jobs are eliminated as you’re suggesting?

Nothing, I'm not commenting on the current job action. Like I said, my own dad stocked shelves at Safeway so I know how difficult and underpaid these jobs are. It made me feel that these jobs are not needed and are unfulfilling. I didn't want to see him doing that as his only option. I'm broadening the subject to talk about long term labor issues.

It seems like using terms like unfulfilling and unskilled are flaring up tensions when I don't think anybody here is advocating for worker harm or exploitative labor practices.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by Hack&Lube

Nothing, I'm not commenting on the current job action. Like I said, my own dad stocked shelves at Safeway so I know how difficult and underpaid these jobs are. It made me feel that these jobs are not needed and are unfulfilling. I didn't want to see him doing that as his only option. I'm broadening the subject to talk about long term labor issues.

It seems like using terms like unfulfilling and unskilled are flaring up tensions when I don't think anybody here is advocating for worker harm or exploitative labor practices.

But they very clearly are needed right now and are fulfilling to some people, so...

[Jason14h]

Te beauty of capitalism is everyone can choose to not shop there now and bankrupt them !

Or will people still shop there because they are cheaper !

I refuse to shop at Walmart and Superstore because of how scummy they are.

Vote with your wallet !

[CMPunk]

Originally Posted by Traditional_Ale

Let them eat cake!

Seriously, though, good on the workers for standing up for this. The $2.00 raise should never have been clawed back. What a PR disaster for Superstore.

That happened to pretty much every retail worker. The liquor stores did it for 2 or 3 months and then told us Covid was over and away went the extra $$

[Ducay]

I mean its capitalism, so every worker is worth what they can get, so let them go for it.

If they can squeeze $2 more from the Westons - more power to them. They certainly have the media on their side right now, so Westons will be more malleable than normal, but ultimately it is indeed unskilled labour than can be replaced in the market.

[Cappy]

Fulfillment in employment has nothing to do with the job being skilled or unskilled, prestigious or disreputable.

I work in a prestigious, “skilled” job and I would say the majority of the profession fines it unfulfilling. I would assume most office workers fine their jobs to be empty and devoid of real meaning.

I look at some jobs and professions and think, “damn that would be fun” or they would hit some level of fulfillment my would requires. I could easily transition and learn the skills of those positions but I don’t because I now need to keep doing what I do to live in the life I have stupidly become accustomed to.

[81MC]

Originally Posted by dino7c

I would be considered a "skilled" worker but you wouldn't want me working your till or bagging your groceries because it would take forever and I would totally suck at it to the point of running out of the building crying most likely.

Even when I have to bag my own things people are often asking to play though.

Yes, but the fact your a ‘skilled’ worker doesn’t mean anything in that context. A computer engineer couldn’t just walk onto a job site and start framing either.

No one of the street could just start being a cashier. But generally, the training is short and technical requirements so minimal that they could be job ready well within 30 days. It has nothing to do with the whether it’s hard on your back or stressful or exposes you to people you don’t like. It’s a category for job roles that can be filled and executed as needed by people without higher education or experience levels. That’s it, it’s not a bad or derogatory thing, it’s just a descriptor.

‘Entry level’ sounds nicer, but carries the context that the role has a next level, or room for growth. I’d be curious what the growth potential is for someone who gets hired for stocking shelves is? Again, that’s not an indictment of the worker or the role.

[Scroopy Noopers]

I can’t think of a single entry level job that doesn’t have the potential to have at least some growth. Managing a grocery store isn’t entry level, and you don’t need a degree to do it.

[Hack&Lube]

There is a huge supply chain issue in the UK right now because of a combination of Covid and Brexit. Britons are discovering that you can't just easily replace many jobs that were paying awful minimum wages.

The UK had a huge reliance on temporary foreign workers from the EU to do "unskilled" labor to do inventory, harvesting, etc. and even "skilled" work like truck driving. The powers that be sold Brexit on the masses in terms of "they took our jobs!" propaganda but it turns out that many Britons don't want to do those jobs at the terrible wages that were being paid. Combined with those EU workers leaving due to Covid and Brexit, their country is currently in a mess with shortages of goods and fuel happening everywhere.

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by Dynamic

Pro tip, get those plastic boxes. I used to be horrible at bagging groceries. I bought four of those yellow plastics totes and I’m the fastest guy at checkout. Not sure if you guys have those out there.

The only reason I still get bags for groceries is that I haven't found anything better for bathroom garbage bins. And the bags are useful for other things too like packing lunches or carrying anything else that you don't want to worry about a return trip for. This is why the move that Superstore made to take bags away from the self checkout area and force you to ask for some from the one lone worker there is infuriating